Establishment of human embryonic brain cell lines

• Published in: In vitro cellular & developmental biology. Animal Vol. 37; no. 5; pp. 259 - 262
• Main Authors: Kumar, B, Hovland, A R, Prasad, JE, Clarkson, E, Cole, W C, Nahreini, P, Freed, C R, Prasad, K N
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 01.05.2001
• Subjects: dopamine
• ISSN: 1071-2690; 1543-706X
• DOI: 10.1290/1071-2690(2001)037(0259:EOHEBC)2.0.CO;2

Allogeneic mesencephalic fetal tissues are used for transplantation into the striata of patients with advanced Parkinson's disease (PD), and of animals with chemical-induced PD. There are, however, several problems, including legality (in some countries), ethics, paucity of available tissue, heterogeneity of cell populations, presence of antigen-presenting cells responsible for allogeneic graft rejection, and unregulated production of dopamine (DA). Therefore, the establishment of permanent cell lines of human brain neurons with specific neuronal phenotypes may be useful in neural transplants, for ameliorating some of the symptoms of advanced neurodegenerative diseases such as PD and Alzheimer's disease. Such cell lines may also be valuable for the study of genes regulating growth, transformation, differentiation, and degeneration of nerve cells. A few normal human cell lines, such as stem cells, capable of differentiating into various cell types are available for neural-transplant studies, but they have not shown any significant promise in the treatment of advanced PD. Our previous studies have shown that it is feasible to establish immortalized rat DA neurons in culture by transfecting fetal brain cells with a plasmid vector, pSV3 sub(nuo), carrying the SV40 virus large T antigen (LTa). These immortalized DA neurons are nonimmunogenic and nontumorigenic. The transplantation of these DA neurons into the striata of 6-hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA)-lesioned rats improved some of the neurological deficits. These encouraging results led us to apply similar plasmid-vector technology to establish human embryonic DA neurons in culture.