Background & objective: Cell immortalization technique has been an important method to establish cell lines with expected phenotype. However, there was few report about the establishment of immortalized human ovarian carcinoma cell lines. The purpose of this study was to establish an immortalized human ovarian sarcomatoid carcinoma cell line, and to investigate its biological characteristics.
Methods: A specimen derived from metastatic tumor of a human ovarian sarcomatoid carcinoma in abdominal wall was obtained and cultured in vitro. The 10th passage was transfected with SV40 T gene, colonies were isolated by G418 selection and expanded to immortalized cell lines. The morphology of the cells was observed by microscope and electromicroscope, Growth curve, karyotype analysis, culturing in soft agar, nude mice transplantation, immunohistochemistry, etc. were used to investigate its biologic characteristics. The biologic characteristics of BUPH: OVSC-2 were compared with its original cells.
Results: After transfection and selection, an immortalized ovarian carcinoma cell line BUPH: OVSC-2 was established. The cell line has been maintained for over 90 passages. The H&E stain finding of transplanted tumor showed that the cells were morphologically sarcomatoid. However, the transmission electron microscopic observation exposed its epithelial origin. The cells grew exuberantly and had high malignant characteristics. Comparative studies revealed that the biological properties of BUPH: OVSC-2 and its original cells were identical.
Conclusions: BUPH: OVSC-2 was demonstrated as an immortalized human ovarian sarcomatoid carcinoma cell line with high malignancy. It retains similar properties of their parental cells and could be a useful model for the study of human ovarian sarcomatoid carcinoma.