Mesenchymal stem cells from different sources show distinct therapeutic effects in hyperoxia‐induced bronchopulmonary dysplasia in rats

Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) have been shown as an effective medicinal means to treat bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD). The widely used MSCs were from Wharton's jelly of umbilical cord (UC‐MSCs) and bone marrow (BM‐MSCs). Amniotic fluid MSCs (AF‐MSCs) may be produced before an individual is born to treat foetal diseases by autoplastic transplantation. We evaluated intratracheal (IT) MSCs as an approach to treat an hyperoxia‐induced BPD animal model and compared the therapeutic effects between AF‐, UC‐ and BM‐MSCs. A BPD animal model was generated by exposing newborn rats to 95% O(2). The continued stress lasted 21 days, and the treatment of IT MSCs was conducted for 4 days. The therapeutic effects were analysed, including lung histology, level of inflammatory cytokines, cell death ratio and state of angiogenesis, by sacrificing the experimental animal at day 21. The lasting hyperoxia stress induced BPD similar to the biological phenotype. The treatment of IT MSCs was safe without deaths and normal organ histopathology. Specifically, the treatment was effective by inhibiting the alveolar dilatation, reducing inflammatory cytokines, inducing angiogenesis and lowering the cell death ratio. AF‐MSCs had better therapeutic effects compared with UC‐MSCs in relieving the pulmonary alveoli histological changes and promoting neovascularization, and UC‐MSCs had the best immunosuppressive effect in plasma and lung lysis compared with AF‐MSCs and BM‐MSCs. This study demonstrated the therapeutic effects of AF‐, UC‐ and BM‐MSCs in BPD model. Superior treatment effect was provided by antenatal MSCs compared to BM‐MSC in a statistical comparison.