Advances in hematopoietic stem cells ex vivo expansion associated with bone marrow niche

Hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) are an ideal source for the treatment of many hematological diseases and malignancies, as well as diseases of other systems, because of their two important features, self-renewal and multipotential differentiation, which have the ability to rebuild the blood system and immune system of the body. However, so far, the insufficient number of available HSCs, whether from bone marrow (BM), mobilized peripheral blood or umbilical cord blood, is still the main restricting factor for the clinical application. Therefore, strategies to expand HSCs numbers and maintain HSCs functions through ex vivo culture are urgently required. In this review, we outline the basic biology characteristics of HSCs, and focus on the regulatory factors in BM niche affecting the functions of HSCs. Then, we introduce several representative strategies used for HSCs from these three sources ex vivo expansion associated with BM niche. These findings have deepened our understanding of the mechanisms by which HSCs balance self-renewal and differentiation and provided a theoretical basis for the efficient clinical HSCs expansion.