Continuous culture of human melanoma cells in protein-free medium: establishment and partial characterization.
Human melanoma cells (MEC) continuously grown in protein-free RPMI-1640 medium were established. These cultured cells, designated "sf-MEC," grow well in suspension and have been successfully subcultured more than 100 passages for 30 months with complete loss of serum requirement for their growth. Although sf-MEC as well as MEC had a moderate number of mature melanosomes in the cytoplasm, the tumorigenicity in nude mice was lower in sf-MEC than in MEC. In the tumor tissue formed by sf-MEC but not by MEC, a few immature melanosomes and an increased C-type-like virus production were detected. Furthermore, conditioned medium of sf-MEC stimulated DNA synthesis in both normal and transformed cells, including MEC and sf-MEC. Addition of the conditioned medium of sf-MEC in its cell growth assay caused a twofold to eighteenfold increase in cell number as compared to that for the control.
D000818:Animals; D002294:Carcinoma, Squamous Cell / Q000473:pathology; D002455:Cell Division; D002460:Cell Line; D003470:Culture Media; D046508:Culture Techniques / Q000379:methods; D006367:HeLa Cells / Q000166:cytology; D006801:Humans; D007700:Kinetics; D008545:Melanoma / Q000473:pathology* / Q000648:ultrastructure; D051379:Mice; D008819:Mice, Nude; D008854:Microscopy, Electron; D009062:Mouth Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology; D009368:Neoplasm Transplantation; D014183:Transplantation, Heterologous
D003470:Culture Media