A NEWLY ESTABLISHED PORCINE AORTIC ENDOTHELIAL-CELL LINE - CHARACTERIZATION AND APPLICATION TO THE STUDY OF HUMAN-TO-SWINE GRAFT-REJECTION

The establishment of cell lines allows reproductible in vitro studies that would be far more difficult to perform using primary cells that r apidly undergo phenotypical alterations in culture. The purpose of thi s work was to establish an endothelial cell line appropriate for in vi tro study of endothelial cell activation during xenograft rejection. P orcine aortic endothelial cells were transfected with the early region of SV40 and selected on the basis of morphological, phenotypical, and functional features. By light and electron microscopy, the porcine ao rtic endothelial cell line (PAEC(11)) and primary cells were similar e xcept that PAEC(11) was slightly smaller. PAEC(11) displayed endotheli al cell characteristics since it endocytosed acetylated low density li poproteins, produced von Willebrand factor, and expressed E-selectin. Human natural antibodies bound to the same xenoantigens on PAEC(11) an d primary cells, That binding was followed by human complement activat ion and cell lysis, In addition, PAEC(11) was found appropriate for ge netic engineering since it could be transfected with a plasmid encodin g a foreign gene. Therefore, this cell line should be a useful model f or ire vitro study of endothelial cell function in general and human-t o-swine xenograft rejection in particular. (C) 1998 Academic Press.