MOUSE LUNG EPITHELIAL-CELL LINES - TOOLS FOR THE STUDY OF DIFFERENTIATION AND THE NEOPLASTIC PHENOTYPE

Several dozen lung epithelial cell lines have been established in cult ure over the past 20 years from normal lung explants and their spontan eous transformants, and from lung tumors that arose spontaneously or w ere induced with chemicals; viruses, or oncogenic transgenes. To provi de information from which to choose appropriate lines for investigatin g problems in lung cell biology and pulmonary neoplasia, this review d escribes the origins of these lines and some of their characteristics. These include growth, morphology, tumorigenicity, ability to metastas ize, xenobiotic metabolism, mutational status, signal transducing acti vities, cytogenetics, ability to form domes, and electric conductance. In addition to collecting this information in a single place for the first time, we describe previously unpublished apoptosis features of s ome of these lines. An increasing number of investigations an beginnin g to use these lines and this review contains references into 1997. (C ) 1997 Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd.