A non-genetic approach to labelling acute myeloid leukemia and bone marrow cells with quantum dots

• Published in: Journal of nanoscience and nanotechnology Vol. 14; no. 6; p. 4014
• Main Authors: Zheng, Yanwen, Tan, Dongming, Chen, Zheng, Hu, Chenxi, Mao, Zhengwei J, Singleton, Timothy P, Zeng, Yan, Shao, Xuejun, Yin, Bin
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States 01.06.2014
• Subjects: Animals; Bone Marrow Cells - cytology; Cell Tracking - methods; Cells, Cultured; HL-60 Cells; Humans; K562 Cells; Leukemia, Myeloid, Acute - pathology; Mice; Mice, Inbred C57BL; Microscopy, Fluorescence - methods; Quantum Dots; Staining and Labeling - methods; Transfection
• ISSN: 1533-4880
• DOI: 10.1166/jnn.2014.8234

The difficulty in manipulation of leukemia cells has long hindered the dissection of leukemia pathogenesis. We have introduced a non-genetic approach of marking blood cells, using quantum dots. We compared quantum dots complexed with different vehicles, including a peptide Tat, cationic polymer Turbofect and liposome. Quantum dots-Tat showed the highest efficiency of marking hematopoietic cells among the three vehicles. Quantum dots-Tat could also label a panel of leukemia cell lines at varied efficiencies. More uniform intracellular distributions of quantum dots in mouse bone marrow and leukemia cells were obtained with quantum dots-Tat, compared with the granule-like formation obtained with quantum dots-liposome. Our results suggest that quantum dots have provided a photostable and non-genetic approach that labels normal and malignant hematopoietic cells, in a cell type-, vehicle-, and quantum dot concentration-dependent manner. We expect for potential applications of quantum dots as an easy and fast marking tool assisting investigations of various types of blood cells in the future.