Control by the Extracellular Environment of Differentiation Pathways in an Embryonal Carcinoma Cell Line (original) (raw)

Communicated by F.Jacob Reeived on I June 1982 1003 is a multipotential embryonal carcinoma (EC) clonal cell line which can be induced to foflow different developmental pathways by altering the composition of the culture medium. When grown in serum-containing medium the great majodty of 1003 cells remain undifferentiated; they express the ECMA 7 cell-surface embryonic antigen and very low amounts of vimentin. In serum-free medium, most 1003 cells differentiate into neuroepithelial cells. The majority of these cells are still labelled with ECMA 7 antibodies. They contain higher amounts of vimentin than EC cells, but no neurofilament proteins. Neuroepithelial cells then differentiate into neurons through a stage of preneurons containing both vimentin and the 70-K neurofilament protein. Fuly differentiated neurons contain 70-K neurofilament protein but no vimentin. The 200-K neurofiament protein is detected later in the neurons. Mesenchymal cells (induced by re-adding serum) express high amounts of vimentin organized in netwodks. Preneurons, neurons, and mesenchymal cells do not express ECMA 7 antigen.