Isolation and culture of primary endothelial cells.

The purpose of this chapter is to describe the isolation techniques that result in pure cultures of human vascular endothelial cells from the umbilical vein and umbilical cord blood. We first describe the isolation of human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs). Additional protocols describe the isolation of umbilical-cord-blood-derived endothelial cells, the basic procedures of endothelial cell culture (including cryopreservation) and the methods used to characterize the phenotype of endothelial cells.