Cell culture on thin tissue sections commonly prepared for histopathology.

Thin tissue sections commonly prepared on a glass slide for histopathology retain many in vivo biochemical attributes related not only to structure but also function. We hypothesized that such tissue sections might serve as novel cell culture substrata that would reflect tissue conditions in vivo. Here we report the applicability of tissue section substrata to tissue reconstruction and serum-free culture. Four different cell types were cultured on section and acellularized section substrata prepared from a bovine placenta. The labyrinth region of the substratum induced cell differentiation to elicit the formation of multicellular spheroids of BeWo cells (human choriocarcinoma cells), a capillary network-like structure for CPAE cells (bovine pulmonary artery endothelial cells), and a neuronal network-like structure for PC-12 cells (rat pheochromocytoma cells). The substratum provided a microenvironment that maintained the viability of PC-12 cells in a serum-free culture. We also succeeded in preparing a multicellular mass of normal human dermal fibroblasts (NHDFs) involving acellularized section-derived components. This technology offers the novel investigation of cell behaviors induced by culturing different cell types on various tissue sections and will be a useful tool for identifying cell characteristics and clarifying the molecular mechanisms that regulate the behavior of each cell type.