We are talking latin here. So, in my opinion one should simply translate latin to english and than it is quite understandable. Ex vivo means that something is experimented on or investigated outside its natural in vivo environment while in vitro means in the test tube. Eg. ex vivo gene therapy means that cells are taken directly from the body, transduced with the gene in vitro and then returned to the body. One may also take an organ from the living body and grow it in vitro, but if one is primarily interested in how does that organ behave outside its natural environment, the expression ex vivo seems to be more appropriate. On the other hand, work on some cell line, which originally developed from the primary culture long time ago, is usually described as an vitro experiment.

Dear Naveen!

Ex vivo:

Refers to a medical procedure in which an organ, cells, or tissue are taken from a living body for treatment or procedure, and then returned to the living body.

In vitro:

A medical test, experiment, or procedure that is done outside of the body, such as in a test tube or laboratory dish

Difference between the two terms:

The major difference is that ex vivo study involves the use of tissues where as in vitro study involves the use of artificial media, which resemble the biological fluids

Hope it helps!

Well... in vitro needs cells or cell-extracts, no ? not only artificial media !

To my opinion, ex vivo is a term that should be used when the studies are carried out with an organ or tissue isolated from an intact organism (it is still functional).

in vitro should be used when a cell (or part of a cell) is isolated from the physiological context in order to simplify the studies.

In both cases the response is probably different (but often complementary!) from the whole organism, and this represents a real chance for the researchers.

ex vivo means outside natural host(cells/tissue) but in vitro is in lab conditions..

Ex vivo is defined by an assay that uses a cell as its basis. A perfect example is the macrophage. In vitro means that the cell in question is cultured/assayed directly.

Here are some of our references which directly compare the in vitro and ex vivo assays for given agents that affect the viability of a bacterium outside and inside the macrophage.

1: Amaral L, Molnar J. Why and how thioridazine in combination with antibiotics

to which the infective strain is resistant will cure totally drug-resistant

tuberculosis. Expert Rev Anti Infect Ther. 2012 Aug;10(8):869-73. doi:

10.1586/eri.12.73. PubMed PMID: 23030326.

2: Amaral L, Martins A, Molnar J, Kristiansen JE, Martins M, Viveiros M,

Rodrigues L, Spengler G, Couto I, Ramos J, Dastidar S, Fanning S, McCusker M,

Pages JM. Phenothiazines, bacterial efflux pumps and targeting the macrophage for

enhanced killing of intracellular XDRTB. In Vivo. 2010 Jul-Aug;24(4):409-24.

PubMed PMID: 20668307.

3: Martins M, Viveiros M, Couto I, Amaral L. Targeting human macrophages for

enhanced killing of intracellular XDR-TB and MDR-TB. Int J Tuberc Lung Dis. 2009

May;13(5):569-73. Review. PubMed PMID: 19383188.

4: Martins M, Viveiros M, Ramos J, Couto I, Molnar J, Boeree M, Amaral L. SILA

421, an inhibitor of efflux pumps of cancer cells, enhances the killing of

intracellular extensively drug-resistant tuberculosis (XDR-TB). Int J Antimicrob

Agents. 2009 May;33(5):479-82. doi: 10.1016/j.ijantimicag.2008.10.028. Epub 2009

Jan 19. PubMed PMID: 19155160.

5: Martins M, Viveiros M, Amaral L. Inhibitors of Ca2+ and K+ transport enhance

intracellular killing of M. tuberculosis by non-killing macrophages. In Vivo.

2008 Jan-Feb;22(1):69-75. PubMed PMID: 18396785.

6: Martins M, Viveiros M, Amaral L. The TB laboratory of the future:

macrophage-based selection of XDR-TB therapeutics. Future Microbiol. 2008

Apr;3(2):135-44. doi: 10.2217/17460913.3.2.135. Review. PubMed PMID: 18366334.

7: Amaral L, Martins M, Viveiros M. Phenothiazines as anti-multi-drug resistant

tubercular agents. Infect Disord Drug Targets. 2007 Sep;7(3):257-65. Review.

PubMed PMID: 17897062.

8: Martins M, Schelz Z, Martins A, Molnar J, Hajös G, Riedl Z, Viveiros M, Yalcin

I, Aki-Sener E, Amaral L. In vitro and ex vivo activity of thioridazine

derivatives against Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Int J Antimicrob Agents. 2007

Mar;29(3):338-40. Epub 2007 Jan 18. PubMed PMID: 17239569.

9: Amaral L, Martins M, Viveiros M. Enhanced killing of intracellular

multidrug-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis by compounds that affect the

activity of efflux pumps. J Antimicrob Chemother. 2007 Jun;59(6):1237-46. Epub

2007 Jan 11. Review. PubMed PMID: 17218448.

10: Martins M, Ordway D, Kristiansen M, Viveiros M, Leandro C, Molnar J, Amaral

L. Inhibition of the Carpobrotus edulis methanol extract on the growth of

phagocytosed multidrug-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis and

methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. Fitoterapia. 2005 Jan;76(1):96-9.

PubMed PMID: 15664469.

11: Martins M, Bleiss W, Marko A, Ordway D, Viveiros M, Leandro C, Pacheco T,

Molnar J, Kristiansen JE, Amaral L. Clinical concentrations of thioridazine

enhance the killing of intracellular methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus:

an in vivo, ex vivo and electron microscopy study. In Vivo. 2004

Nov-Dec;18(6):787-94. PubMed PMID: 15646821.

12: Ordway D, Hohmann J, Viveiros M, Viveiros A, Molnar J, Leandro C, Arroz MJ,

Gracio MA, Amaral L. Carpobrotus edulis methanol extract inhibits the MDR efflux

pumps, enhances killing of phagocytosed S. aureus and promotes immune modulation.

Phytother Res. 2003 May;17(5):512-9. PubMed PMID: 12748989.

13: Ordway D, Viveiros M, Leandro C, Bettencourt R, Almeida J, Martins M,

Kristiansen JE, Molnar J, Amaral L. Clinical concentrations of thioridazine kill

intracellular multidrug-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Antimicrob Agents

Chemother. 2003 Mar;47(3):917-22. PubMed PMID: 12604522; PubMed Central PMCID:

PMC149316.

14: Ordway D, Viveiros M, Leandro C, Jorge Arroz M, Molnar J, Kristiansen JE,

Amaral L. Chlorpromazine has intracellular killing activity against phagocytosed

Staphylococcus aureus at clinical concentrations. J Infect Chemother. 2002

Sep;8(3):227-31. PubMed PMID: 12373485.

15: Ordway D, Viveiros M, Leandro C, Arroz MJ, Amaral L. Intracellular activity

of clinical concentrations of phenothiazines including thioridiazine against

phagocytosed Staphylococcus aureus. Int J Antimicrob Agents. 2002

Jul;20(1):34-43. PubMed PMID: 12127709.

Dear Naveen, My answer is not as complete as it should have been.

Firstly, any assay that is conducted with material from a living source is an in vitro (glass container) assay.

Secondly, to distinguish a pure in vitro assay from an ex vivo assay, depends solely on the question being asked. If the question is "what has happened to a given cell after treatment of the animal, the assay used to answer this question involves an in vitro process. If the question asked is "what happens when a given cell/tissue/organ is removed from the animal and treated, the assay is ex vivo.

Thanks every one for your valuable suggestions...very helpful to me...

@Leonard Amaral : have you inverted the anwers in your final in vitro/ex vivo explaination ?

Normally ex-vivo means----you do an experiment on living animals like mice, rat, gunipeage, dog, monkey etc.

In vitro means- you use glassware with organisms or artificial media to perform assay.

in vivo inside (in expermintal animal), ex vivo outside (in lab.)

Ex-vivo: You apply a treatment (or procedure) in vivo, and then, you extract the tissue or cells from the animal (system) and you measure a variable in vitro. Thus, it is a crossover experiment between in vivo and in vitro.

We are talking latin here. So, in my opinion one should simply translate latin to english and than it is quite understandable. Ex vivo means that something is experimented on or investigated outside its natural in vivo environment while in vitro means in the test tube. Eg. ex vivo gene therapy means that cells are taken directly from the body, transduced with the gene in vitro and then returned to the body. One may also take an organ from the living body and grow it in vitro, but if one is primarily interested in how does that organ behave outside its natural environment, the expression ex vivo seems to be more appropriate. On the other hand, work on some cell line, which originally developed from the primary culture long time ago, is usually described as an vitro experiment.

Ex vivo is the study of an organ or tissue (functional) isolated from an intact organism while in vitro is the study of a cell (or part of a cell) isolated from an intact organism in order to simplify the studies. In both cases the response will be different (but may be complementary) from the whole organism.

In vivo means you do your test inside the living body i.e. inside animal body directly while ex vivo that you draw cells from a body then make your test on them aseptically in the laboratory and then return these cells to the same body. Hoping you got the difference

In vitro is basically tests carried out in a physicochemically asceptic environment, of course outside a living organism with the purpose of using the results in vivo. Ex vivo is invivo removal of an organ or a tissue, and working on it or doing whatever you intend with it in an external environment, that is an environment that is not native to the organ or tissue you removed.

Ex vivo is a resultant of mixing in vivo and in vitro. In vivo means all test done incside the body, in vitro means tests done outside the body i.e. in the laboratory. Ex vivo means the test temporary outside the body but mostly inside the body.

You may find this article useful. Disregard the fact that it's written in layman terms

http://www.askmedicalresearchers.com/in-vivo-in-vitro-ex-vivo/

There are two underlying factors about the two terms - In or Ex and vivo. The key is the vivo - measures dynamics of the living system either in whole or in part. So, if the study is carried out in the living organism in its natural environment (in vivo), in the living organism or cells in artificial environment (ex vivo), or on the organism or cell which are treated so that it is no longer living then tested in the tubes whether glass, plastic or whatever lab ware, it is said to be in vitro. Fluids, cells/ tissues could all be tested in vitro.

Test may be within the body (in) or outside the body (ex). Response being tested may be properties of a living biological system (vivo) or properties of a constituent biological system in a lifeless state.

ex vivo - the test is carried out on tissue/cells taken out from an organism, in an environment, as similar to the natural environment as possible

in vitro - the test is carried out usually in a petridish or test tube, in conditions that may or may not mimic natural environment

All the answer above are correct. I was just reading an article involving ex vivo and in vitro techniques (link provided). According to the published literature, I am interpret the following observation:

ex vivo involved obtaining the macrophages directly from the subjects and staining and observing them directly. Here we are not growing the cells neither modifying them (and regarding the ex vivo gene many had already provided their opinion in the comments above).

in vitro  involved isolating the monocytes and growing them into full fledged macrophage by providing the natural stimulation condition artificially.

Hope this gives you a better understanding.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25254931

"in vitro" is: both experiment and analysis are done outside of organism, such as in culture cell in culture flask.

and "ex vivo" is: experiment itself was done inside of organism(-s) (in vivo) but samples (i.e. organs or tissues) were removed from organisms and analyzed outside (in vitro)

To my opinion:

ex vivo: procedures  involve living cells or tissues taken from an organism and cultured in a laboratory apparatus that are used directly to the experiment (Without biological modifications before start the experiment)

in vitro: the samples to be tested are obtained from a repository (e.g: cell line) or taken from alive organism but "transformed" or significantly modified before the precedures to answere the experimental question began (e.g. Cells are taken from a person, then are transformed with EBV to stablish a cell line, and then are subjected to experiments)

The results of ex vivo only apply to the organism supplying the cell whereas the in vitro results only apply to the cell line used.

 I think  this link provides a nice explanation. http://www.askmedicalresearchers.com/in-vivo-in-vitro-ex-vivo/

"Ex vivo" means an organ or a tissue coming from in vivo "leaving body" (usually from animals including humans) and maintained in vitro (often in the same media than those used for in vitro experiments) without replacement of the tissue or the organ in the body after the experimentation ...

In most of the cases both in vitro and ex vivo experiments use artificial media.

In most cases, in vitro experiments refer to single cell populations while ex vivo experiments relate to tissues or organs maintained in vitro for short period of times.

Best regards

Robert

What is the main difference between ex vivo and in vitro tests in pharmacological experiments ? - ResearchGate. Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/post/What_is_the_main_difference_between_ex_vivo_and_in_vitro_tests_in_pharmacological_experiments [accessed May 16, 2016].

Ex vivo means experimental model is part of living organism and that can't survive outside the body for long time. Example is culturing lymphocytes or fibroblast of skin. 

Invitro system is like chemical reactions..where you keep reactants. It is self sustainable system and not limited to time. Example is transformed cell lines where you can test anything by culturing cells for long. Once the cells are dead they are like complex molecular system.

"...........ex vivo and in vitro preparations can be used as test systems. Ex vivo and

in vitro systems can include, but are not limited to: isolated organs and tissues, cell cultures, cellular fragments, subcellular organelles, receptors, ion channels, transporters and enzymes. In vitro systems can be used in supportive studies (e.g., to

obtain a profile of the activity of the substance or to investigate the mechanism of effects observed in vivo)." Please see: http://www.fda.gov/downloads/drugs/guidancecomplianceregulatoryinformation/guidances/ucm074959.pdf

In my opinion, Ex vivo  means direct removal of our cell,tissue or organ of interest and maintaining in vitro  for short period under culture condition. But unlikely under in vitro condition, in the above process isolated cell, tissue or organ will be transformed and subjected to proliferation for extended period of time. Hence, we can say that ex vivo is more nearest to in vivo approach.

What is the difference between Invivo, Insitu, Exvivo and Invitro?

In vivo is in the living organism, In situ is exactly at the place, ex vivo is outside the living organism and in vitro is in the test tube (Petri dish etc.)

The responses have been very helpful to me. 

I know this thread is 4 years old, with 18673 reads as of now (indicating that this question is of wide interest). I also suspect that Naveen (who posted the original question) may well have graduated by now, and moved on to perhaps much bigger questions.

While I read through the responses above, I realized two things (sorry, no offense to anyone): (1) the responses did not realize the depth of this question, and quite evidently reflect the definitions widely available by 'googling', and (2) even guidelines from eminent regulatory organizations like FDA fail to realize the depth of this question. I shall provide examples for why I am making these two statements. And I ask for a little serious thought here (I have no clear answer to this question; see below).

As a recap: studying the effects of a drug on an animal when the whole animal is administered, is an example of "in vivo" study. Study of that drug on an isolated tissue of the animal, when the tissue is taken out and treated outside the animal's body, is "ex vivo". Study of the same drug on cells derived from that animal, but cultured and treated in artificial medium, is "in vitro".

So far, fine. The complication comes when you come across hundreds of research articles, even in top CNS (Cell-Nature-Science)-type journals, where cell culture experiments are referred to as both "in vitro", and sometimes, "in vivo". In practical writing of a research article, I think it is the context that dictates what terms should be used, and when. Let me give an example below.

Cell culture-based experiments have defined critical events that lead to recognition of origin sequences for eukaryotic DNA replication, assembly of multiple multi-protein complexes and recruitment of many accessory factors and enzymatic activities in distinct orders, which finally culminates in DNA replication initiation. We call these studies "in vitro", as these events were dissected "inside the cultured cells".

Now, take the incredibly magnificent work from John Diffley's lab reported in Nature (Article Regulated Eukaryotic DNA Replication Origin Firing with Puri...

Things get a bit more complicated when we follow the works such as those by Nobel laureate Jack Szostak. His group would not even use purified DNA/proteins prepared from extracts derived from cells, as Diffley did. They would synthesize membrane-like polymers and other chemicals to retrace how a primitive environment may have created "basic functional entities" of life, nearly 4 billion years ago. His approach, now we see, are even a big distance away from Diffley's cell-free "in vitro" setup. What do we call that?

I do not have answers. But I do not think we can dismissively and promptly demarcate what is in vivo, what is in vitro, and what is not. For scientists like Roger Kornberg, who studied cell-free "in vitro" mechanisms of transcription, a cell-based experiment would be truly "in vivo". In turn, animal-based experimentalists would laugh at cell-based scientists, saying cells do not qualify to be called in vivo, and animals do!

So, do we bring "context" into it, and call anything "in vitro", "in vivo" etc as the situation fits? Or, should we adopt clear, unambiguous, distinct terms for distinct experimental approaches? Sorry Naveen, I don't think we have clear answer to your question yet.

I shall appreciate "thoughts" on this question (but, may I request no more copy-paste responses, please?).

May I know why some are using 95% o2 and some are using 21% o2 for ex vivo?

@Anil Panigrahi

Thanks for your comments. that was very useful for me.

This was really helpful!

Thank you Floriana, your answer is very helpfull

As a simple description

Ex vivo means that which takes place outside an organism. In science, ex vivo refers to experimentation or measurements done in or on tissue from an organism in an external environment with minimal alteration of natural conditions.

Studies that are in vivo are those in which the effects of various biological entities are tested on whole, living organisms or cells, usually animals, including humans, and plants, as opposed to a tissue extract or dead organism.

In vivo means one which is carried on inside the body of a living organism.

In situ means one which is carried on exactly at the site/place.

Ex vivo means one which is performed outside the body with minimal alteration of the natural conditions.

In vitro means one which is performed outside the body, in the test tube withe the same natural conditions.

I wanted to mention my understanding of in vitro referring to laboratory experiments or diagnostics "in or under glass" such as test tubes, glass slides for microscopy or Petri dishes (this could include today's "version of glass" in clear plastics). Studying the full body of a rotifer (a microscopic animal) still inside its own body, can still be done in vitro, on a glass slide.

Other answers:

a) We use the term "in vivo" when we carry out cultures of cells taken directly from volunteer subjects (donors or patients), or from animals.

b) The term "in vitro" is used for the cell-lines culture.

Thank you everyone))

In vitro: Outside the body. (Laboratory/ test tubes).

In vivo: Inside the body of whole living organism.

Ex vivo: Outside of the living body. (i.e., Organ, cells or tissue).

In situ: Experiment carried on exactly at the site/place.

Very helpful responses. Thanks all

in silico means performed on a computer or via computer simulation in reference to experiments. Validation between in silico and in vitro or in vivo results can confirm or refute the digital model, allowing for biological data-driven improvements to the simulation model.

The response of Floriana Bulic-Jakus is convincing. Thank you.

Ex vivo models are often utilized to study biomarkers during various phases of wound healing, for example.