Petaka Cell Culturing System in Action

Used for Hypoxia Induction
Cells are the engine of cell-based assays. Our Petaka^TM Cell Culture System knock-down barriers that stand between you and success. The system is especially designed to grow cells in an isolated, auto-modified environment, highly protected from external environmental conditions.

In this study, for hypoxia induction, Petaka G3 low oxygen transfer flasks (Neuromics) were used to culture melanoma cell lines or primary melanocytes for 48–96 h at 37°C until >80% confluent: Rachel L. G. Maus, James W. Jakub, Wendy K. Nevala, Trace A. Christensen, Klara Noble-Orcutt, Zohar Sachs, Tina J. Hieken, and Svetomir N. Markovic. Human Melanoma-Derived Extracellular Vesicles Regulate Dendritic Cell Maturation. Front Immunol. 2017; 8: 358. Published online 2017
Mar 29. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2017.00358.

Hypoxia increases extracellular vesicles (EVs) production in metastatic melanoma cell line SKMEL28 not primary melanocytes. Melanoma cell lines and adult primary melanocytes were cultured under hypoxia or normoxia conditions for 48 h. Morphology and CD63 vesicle marker expression of SKMEL28 EVs was confirmed by immune electron microscopy (A) and vesicle size distribution and particle concentration measured by nanoparticle tracking analysis (Nanosight) [(B), representative image]. Total concentration of normoxic (gray) or hypoxic (black) vesicles isolated from three melanoma cell lines and healthy primary melanocytes was quantified by Nanosight following three replicate 30-s video captures of three EV preparations (C) (n = 3 independent experiments).

Petaka advantages include:

• No requirement of CO2 incubator or humid incubator. 
• Exact volume of media per culture. 
• Cell growth on vertical walls segregates cells and debris. 
• Negligible dehydration rates Protected against leaks or spills. 
• Higher cell yields. 
• Shipping and short term cell maintenance at room temperature.

Human Melanoma Cancer Associated Fibroblasts

More Hard to Find Human Cells
We are recognized for providing potent, pure and easy to culture CAFs and Immortalized Tumor Cells. We are pleased to announce the addition of Melanoma CAFS. Our introductory price is only 899 USD/1,000,000 Cells. They have been successfully passaged 10X.

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Image: Human Melanoma Cells in Culture

Need CAFs or Tumor Cells? Just email me at pshuster@neuromics.com.

SOX2 as a Marker for Melanoma

I would like to post a new application for our SOX2 neural progenitor marker.

Alvaro C. Laga, Qian Zhan,Carsten Weishaupt, Jie Ma, Markus H. Frank, George F. Murphy. SOX2 and nestin expression in human melanoma: an immunohistochemical and experimental study. Experimental Dermatology. Volume 20, Issue 4, pages 339–345, April 2011. DOI: 10.1111/j.1600-0625.2011.01247.x.

SOX2 is an embryonic neural crest stem-cell transcription factor recently shown to be expressed in human melanoma and to correlate with experimental tumor growth. SOX2 binds to an enhancer region of the gene that encodes for nestin, also a neural progenitor cell biomarker. To define further the potential relationship between SOX2 and nestin, we examined co-expression patterns in 135 melanomas and 37 melanocytic nevi. Immunohistochemical staining in 27 melanoma tissue sections showed an association between SOX2 positivity, spindle cell shape and a peripheral nestin distribution pattern. In contrast, SOX2-negative cells were predominantly epithelioid, and exhibited a cytoplasmic pattern for nestin. In tissue microarrays, co-expression correlated with tumor progression, with only 11% of nevi co-expressing SOX2 and nestin in contrast to 65% of metastatic melanomas, and preliminarily, with clinical outcome. Human melanoma lines that differentially expressed constitutive SOX2 revealed a positive correlation between SOX2 and nestin expression. Experimental melanomas grown from these respective cell lines in murine subcutis and dermis of xenografted human skin maintained the association between SOX2-positivity, spindle cell shape, and peripheral nestin distribution. Moreover, the cytoplasmic pattern of nestin distribution was observed in xenografts generated from SOX2-knockdown A2058 melanoma cells, in contrast to the periperhal nestin pattern seen in tumors grown from A2058 control cells transfected with non-target shRNA. In aggregate, these data further support a biologically significant linkage between SOX2 and nestin expression in human melanoma.