Successive T-precursors isolated from adult mouse thymus were examined for their developmental potential, by transfer to irradiated Ly 5-disparate recipients. The earliest, "low CD4" precursors formed T, B, and dendritic cells (DC), but not myeloid cells, in accordance with earlier studies. Surprisingly, the next downstream CD4-8-3 44+25+ precursor population still formed DC as well as T cells although it no longer formed B or myeloid cells. Further down-stream, the CD4-8 3-44-25+ population formed only T cells. The thymic and splenic DC progeny of the early thymic precursors all expressed high levels of CD8 alpha, in contrast with normal splenic DC and the splenic DC progeny of bone marrow stem cells, which consisted of both CD8 and CD8+ DC. A common precursor of T cells and of a subclass of DC is proposed, with CD8 alpha as a marker of the lymphoid-related DC lineage.

Murine bone marrow Lin-, Ly6A/E+ cells have been fractionated on the basis of rhodamine123 retention into Rh123med/hi and Rh123lo subpopulations. These populations have different responses to hemopoietic growth factors with respect to in vitro colony formation. Cells from either fraction were not stimulated by only granulocyte-colony-stimulating factor (G-CSF), granulocyte/macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF), macrophage colony-stimulating factor (M-CSF), interleukins 1 and 6 (IL-1 and -6), or leukemia inhibitory factor (LIF) alone. The Rh123med/hi, but not the Rh123lo fraction, contained cells that could be stimulated by either stem cell factor (SCF) or IL-3 alone. When combinations of growth factors were added, the Rh123med/hi fraction produced more colonies, and responded to a wider range of factor combinations than the Rh123lo population. When tested in vivo, both populations contained no detectable day 8 colony-forming unit-spleen (CFU-S), and similar frequencies of day 13 CFU-S. When transplanted into lethally irradiated recipients (100 cells/recipient), significant numbers of donor cells (67-73%) were found in the peripheral blood of Rh123lo recipients. Both myeloid and lymphoid cells were of donor origin. By comparison, the Rh123med/hi population produced recipients with 1-2% donor cells in peripheral blood, the majority of which were lymphoid.