Fig. 7

Col2-positive progenitors from different tissues have varied differentiation potential. a CFU-F assay of Col2⁺ bone marrow stem cells (BMSCs), GP progenitors and AC progenitors showing that every cell type can form CFU colonies. b Adipogenic differentiation of Col2⁺ BMSCs, GP progenitors and AC progenitors. c Osteogenic differentiation of Col2⁺ BMSCs, GP progenitors and AC progenitors. d Chondrogenic differentiation of Col2⁺ BMSCs, GP progenitors and AC progenitors. e Merged pictures showing Col2⁺ cells cultured from the calvaria of Col2-cre;tdTomato and Col2-cre;DTA^+/−;tdTomato newborns. Note that few Col2⁺ cells were detected in the Col2⁺ cell ablation group, confirming the effectiveness of the cell ablation technique. f Assay of the trilineage differentiation of cells cultured from the calvarial bone of Col2-cre and Col2-cre;DTA^+/− newborns (n = 3 mice per condition; three independent experiments). g Different migration abilities of cells cultured from Col2-cre and Col2-cre;DTA^+/− newborns. h Quantitative measurements of migration ability based on the results shown in (g) (n = 3 mice per condition; three independent experiments). All the data are reported as the means ± s.ds. The statistical significance was determined by one-way ANOVA and Student’s t test. *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, ***P < 0.000 1, NS not statistically significant