Animal Biotechnology

CELL LINES

• Cell lines can be divided into two types: adherent (monolayer cells) and non-adherent (suspension cells).
• Adherent cells attach to the plastic surface of a flask or plate and therefore need to be detached from this surface before they can be used.
• Suspended cells do not normally attach to the surface of the culture vessel.
• The cell lines may be propagated in an unaltered form for a limited number of cell generations beyond which they may either die out or give rise to continuous cell lines.
• The continuous cell lines are often aneuploid and have larger variation in chromosome number. The alteration in culture, giving rise to a continuous cell line is commonly called in vitro transformation.