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Serum-free culture of enriched mouse anterior and ventral prostatic epithelial cells in collagen gel

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Summary

Sustained growth of mouse ventral and anterior prostatic epithelial cells embedded within collagen gel matrix was achieved in a serum-free medium composed of Dulbecco's modified Eagle's medium and Ham's F12 medium, 1∶1 (vol/vol), supplemented with bovine serum albumin fraction V, epidermal growth factor, transferrin, cholera toxin, prolactin, 5α-dihydrotestosterone, cortisol, putrescine, fibroblast growth factor, and a trace element mixture. Three-dimensional growth of prostatic epithelial cells occurred inside the collagen gel matrix. This serum-free medium allowed cell growth greater than sevenfold over 10 d in culture. Tissue recombination and cell culture techniques were integrated to demonstrate that cultured cells retained prostatic characteristics. Following 10 d of culture, epithelial colonies from mouse ventral and anterior prostatic epithelial cell cultures were isolated and combined with rat fetal urogenital sinus mesenchyme and grown for 4 wk under the renal capsule of intact athymic male mice. These tissue recombinants showed distinctive prostatic histologic characteristic (alveoli and ducts lined with cuboidal or columnar epithelium surrounded by stroma). When histologic sections of recombinants were stained with the Hoechst 33258, epithelial cells of mouse origin were distinguishable from stromal cells of rat origin.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Cancer Research Laboratory and Department of Integrative Biology, University of California, 94720, Berkeley, California

    Howard A. Bern

  2. Department of Anatomy, University of California, 94143, San Francisco, California

    Timothy Turner, Peter Young & Gerald R. Cunha

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  1. Timothy Turner
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  2. Howard A. Bern
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  3. Peter Young
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  4. Gerald R. Cunha
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Aided by grants CA-05388 and CA-09041 from the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, and by M. A. R. C. fellowship GM08730 to T. T.

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Turner, T., Bern, H.A., Young, P. et al. Serum-free culture of enriched mouse anterior and ventral prostatic epithelial cells in collagen gel. In Vitro Cell Dev Biol 26, 722–730 (1990). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02624429

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02624429

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