Isolation and Maintenance of In Vitro Cell Cultures from the Ctenophore Mnemiopsis leidyi.

The ability to isolate, monitor, and examine specific cells of interest enables targeted experimental manipulations that would otherwise be difficult to perform and interpret in the context of the whole organism. In vitro primary cell cultures derived from ctenophores thus serve as an important tool for understanding complex cellular and molecular interactions that take place both within and between various ctenophore cell types. Here we describe methods for reliably generating and maintaining primary cell cultures derived from the lobate ctenophore Mnemiopsis leidyi that can be used for a wide variety of experimental applications.