Most leukemic cell lines and primary blood samples originated from cells that were moving throughout the circulatory system. Isn't it likely that culturing them in a still setting may be altering their properties (transcription, differentiation, etc.)? Why are there so few culture systems available or used in the literature that account for this difference? After all, the goal is to make the model as similar to actual physiology as possible, correct? I haven't been able to ever find any material on this topic; any input would be useful.
Hi Andrew,
Blood cells are in their end phase of differentiation. Precursor cells and their cell division occurs in the bone marrow. Most of the leukemic cell production occurs in bone marrow and later they appear in circulation. See aleukemia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leukemia). I hope this gives you some extra thoughts.
With kind regards,
Karoly
Thanks for the response. I just wonder if there may be an ignored effect that is occurring when cells exit circulation and are developed into cell lines in still culture. I know there have recently been several studies in which hemodynamics was shown to be capable of altering cellular properties such as DNA methylation. If this is the case, a lot of data using suspension cell lines could be less applicable to human studies. Even the bone marrow niche is not similar to the hemodynamic environment of a still culture dish. Ultimately, I just wonder whether the models used for study could be improved to make it as representative of the real conditions as possible, and why these models haven't significantly shifted through the years.
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