Production of Hormones by Human Anterior Pituitary Cells in Serial Culture

Abstract

Human pituitary cells from adult and fetal glands were serially propagated in stationary and suspension cultures for periods of many months. Such cells were frozen, stored, and recultivated. Bio-assays of stationary cultures indicated gonadotropin, corticotropin and somatotropin were present in amounts greater than in the control medium. Gonadotropin (follicle-stimulating and interstitial cell-stimulating) was produced in significant amounts in suspension cultures of a line of chromophobe-like cells. Stained by the iron-periodic acid-Schiff method their cytoplasm showed masses having a characteristic peacock-blue color when examined with "phase" microscopy, and pink, with bright-field. They were heteroploid with a chromosome count in a narrow range with modality at 79.