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European Urology
Volume 57, issue 3, pages 363-550, March 2010Letters to the Editor published online
Re: Minja J. Pfeiffer, Jack A. Schalken. Stem Cell Characteristics in Prostate Cancer Cell Lines. Eur Urol 2010;57:246–55
Tomasz Drewa 
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Accepted 2 November 2009, Published online 8 November 2009, page e26
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Refers to article:
Stem Cell Characteristics in Prostate Cancer Cell Lines
Accepted 8 January 2009
February 2010 (Vol. 57, Issue 2, pages 246 - 255)
Article Outline
I have read an interesting paper on stem cell characteristics in prostate cancer cell lines [1]. The authors analyzed the presence of stem cells within six prostate cancer cell lines: DU145, DuCaP, LAPC-4, 22Rv1, LNCaP, and PC-3.
It was found that only the DU145 cell line had a small fraction (0.01%) of CD133+ cells. No differences were detected between CD133+ and CD133− cells in their capacity to form holoclones in vitro. The authors concluded that CD133 is not a marker for stem cells in prostate cancer cell lines. Alternatively, CD133 was established as a stem cell marker of normal prostate epithelium. CD133 was also regarded as a stem cell marker in primary cultures established from prostate tumor explants [2]. The results presented by Pfeiffer and Schalken are important but also confusing because they indicate the problem of instability in in vitro models (cell lines).
It was previously found that LNCaP cells derived from low- and high-passage numbers display divergent responses to androgens and retinoids [3]. It was proved that culture condition and passage number can change the genetic and phenotypic characteristic of cells lines [4]. It has to be emphasized that cross-contamination of cell lines is also often found (15%), and probably a higher percentage of contamination with other cells can be detected among popular cell lines like HeLa [5].
Can we rely on these models of immortal cell lines that are established in vitro? How removed are the immortal cell lines from tumor-derived primary cultures? Do these immortal lines contain stem cells at all? It seems that we need time to answer.
Conflicts of interest
The author has nothing to disclose.
References
- [1] M.J. Pfeiffer, J.A. Schalken. Stem cell characteristics in prostate cancer cell lines. Eur Urol 57 (2010) (246 - 255) Abstract, Full-text, PDF, Crossref.
- [2] J. Miki, B. Furusato, H. Li, et al.. Identification of putative stem cell markers, CD133 and CXCR, in hTERT-immortalized primary nonmalignant and malignant tumor-derived human prostate epithelial cell lines and in prostate cancer specimens. Cancer Res 67 (2007) (3153 - 3161) Crossref.
- [3] M. Esquenet, J.V. Swinnen, W. Heyns, G. Verhoeven. LNCaP prostatic adenocarcinoma cells derived from low and high passage numbers display divergent responses not only to androgens but also to retinoids. J Steroid Biochem Mol Biol 62 (1997) (391 - 399) Crossref.
- [4] S.L. Wenger, J.R. Senft, L.M. Sargent, R. Bamezai, N. Bairwa, S.G. Grant. Comparison of established cell lines at different passages by karyotype and comparative genomic hybridization. Biosci Rep 24 (2004) (631 - 639) Crossref.
- [5] G.C. Buehring, E.A. Eby, M.J. Eby. Cell line cross-contamination: how aware are mammalian cell culturists of the problem and how to monitor it?. In Vitro Cell Dev Biol Anim 40 (2004) (211 - 215) Crossref.
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