Engineering osteoarthritic cartilage model through differentiating senescent human mesenchymal stem cells for testing disease-modifying drugs

Significant cellular senescence has been observed in cartilage harvested from patients with osteoarthritis (OA). In this study, we aim to develop a senescence-relevant OA-like cartilage model for developing disease-modifying OA drugs (DMOADs). Specifically, human bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stromal cells (MSCs) were expanded in vitro up to passage 10 (P10-MSCs). Following their senescent phenotype formation, P10-MSCs were subjected to pellet culture in chondrogenic medium. Results from qRT-PCR, histology, and immunostaining indicated that cartilage generated from P10-MSCs displayed both senescent and OA-like phenotypes without using other OA-inducing agents, when compared to that from normal passage 4 (P4)-MSCs. Interestingly, the same gene expression differences observed between P4-MSCs and P10-MSC-derived cartilage tissues were also observed between the preserved and damaged OA cartilage regions taken from human samples, as demonstrated by RNA Sequencing data and other analysis methods. Lastly, the utility of this senescence-initiated OA-like cartilage model in drug development was assessed by testing several potential DMOADs and senolytics. The results suggest that pre-existing cellular senescence can induce the generation of OA-like changes in cartilage. The P4- and P10-MSCs derived cartilage models also represent a novel platform for predicting the efficacy and toxicity of potential DMOADs on both preserved and damaged cartilage in humans.