Methods: Deciduous teeth (n=56) were obtained from children receiving dental treatment. Cell suspensions of MSCs were isolated from dental pulp tissue by mechanical and enzymatic disaggregation, and expanded in tissue culture flasks. Successful cell lines were grouped as anterior teeth (n=6), posterior teeth (n=5), females (n=6) and males (n=4). STRO-1 antibody was used to detect MSCs. Mean percentage of STRO-1+ cells was calculated and compared using T-test. Pearson Correlation was used to identify the pattern of STRO-1+ expression from passage P3 to P10. Cell cycle of STRO-1+ cells was analysed using Propidium Iodide.
Results: The percentage of STRO-1+ cells derived from anterior teeth was lower (66.20%) than the posterior teeth (71.18%). The percentage of STRO-1+ cells from females was also lower (60.47%) than males (72.72%). However, these differences were not statistically significant. Most of the STRO-1+ cells (59.40%) were able to proliferate and two cell lines showed high STRO-1+ expression (> 90%) up to P10.
Conclusion: Viable MSCs with proliferative capacity were isolated from exfoliated deciduous teeth. However, there were no differences in the relative abundance of STRO-1 expression among the cells derived from different types of teeth and the gender of donors. High STRO-1+ expression across cell lines showed that the isolated MSCs retained its stem cell characteristics.