Figure 1

Schematic representation of the invasion assay. BM-MNC cells were resuspended in 5% v/v human albumin and placed in the upper part of a modified Boyden chamber Matrigel invasion chamber. The chamber consist of a 24-well cell culture insert with an 8 μm pore size PET membrane, uniformly coated with Matrigel matrix. The matrix provides a barrier to non-invasive cells while presenting an appropriate protein structure for invading cells to penetrate before passing through the membrane. The chamber was then placed in a 24-well culture dish containing 500 μl of Endocult basal medium supplemented with Endocult single quots (Stemcells technologies, Vancouver, Canada) and 20% fetal calf serum. After 24 h of incubation transmigrated cells were counted.