Making Things Grow: Insect Cells, Stem Cells, and Primary Cell Lines All Pose Challenges for Cell Culturists
Date: June 22, 1998 Insect Cell Culture Media, Suppliers of Primary Cell Culture Media Advantages for Protein Expression Studies Since the mid-1950s cultures of insects--cockroaches, fruit flies, and leafhoppers, to name a few--have been the object of quiet study by physiologists and cell biologists. But along came genetic engineering and suddenly insect cultures have been put in the spotlight since they provide advantages over both bacterial and mammalian systems for recombinant protein prod
Jun 21, 1998
Date: June 22, 1998 | ![]() |
Since the mid-1950s cultures of insects--cockroaches, fruit flies, and leafhoppers, to name a few--have been the object of quiet study by physiologists and cell biologists. But along came genetic engineering and suddenly insect cultures have been put in the spotlight since they provide advantages over both bacterial and mammalian systems for recombinant protein production. While easy and inexpensive to use for large-scale production of proteins, bacterial systems often do not produce correctly modified and immunologically active proteins from eukaryotic sequences; mammalian cell cultures can be expensive to grow in bulk and require carefully controlled environments for optimum growth. In contrast to this, insect cells grow at room temperature and do not require CO2, which greatly simplifies the job of growing cells, while sporting a perfectly adequate transfection system for...