Abstract
A strain of fibroblasts, obtained from the heart of a chick embryo on January 17, 1912, has completed the tenth year of its life in vitro. On April 19, 1922, our incubators contained about 60 cultures which represented the 1906th generation of the connective tissue cells. Their growth is as rapid as during the past years, each fragment generally doubling its volume in 48 hours. In 10 years, more than 30,000 cultures have been derived from a fragment of heart less than 1 cubic millimeter in size. This demonstrates first, that the cells transform the food stuffs in their medium into protoplasm. Second, under the conditions of the experiments, the cells are no longer subject to the influence of time, as they are when living within the organism, and demonstrate that they are potentially immortal. The cells have now exceeded the average life of chickens, which disposes of criticisms on this point.
Pure cultures of cells are important in studying biological problems. The strain responds readily to changes in the composition of the culture medium by modifying its rate of proliferation. By perfecting the technique, it could be used as a reagent for detecting substances contained in the humors which have the power of activating or decreasing the rate of cell proliferation, and further, to investigate the interactions of the cells and their medium, which are still incompletely known.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.