Open AccessInteractions among clonal subpopulations affect stability of the metastatic phenotype in polyclonal populations of B16 melanoma cells.
Author(s) -
George Poste,
John Doll,
Isaiah J. Fidler
Publication year - 1981
Publication title -
proceedings of the national academy of sciences of the united states of america
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 5.011
H-Index - 771
eISSN - 1091-6490
pISSN - 0027-8424
DOI - 10.1073/pnas.78.10.6226
Subject(s) - biology , polyclonal antibodies , phenotype , population , genetics , serial passage , in vivo , in vitro , immunology , microbiology and biotechnology , antibody , gene , medicine , environmental health
Analysis of the metastatic properties of clones isolated from mouse B16 melanoma cell lines (B16-F1 and F10) shows extensive cellular heterogeneity and the presence of subpopulations that have widely differing metastatic abilities. This pattern of metastatic heterogeneity is maintained during serial passage in vitro and in vivo. In contrast, even a short serial passage of individual clones isolated from these heterogeneous parent lines results in rapid emergence of variant subclones that have different metastatic properties. If several clones are mixed and cocultivated, this instability is not expressed. These data suggest that, in polyclonal populations, the various clonal subpopulations somehow interact with one another to "stabilize" their relative proportions within the population. Restriction of clonal diversity by selective killing of the majority of clones in a polyclonal population eliminates the stabilizing restraints and stimulates rapid emergence of new subpopulations to create heterogeneous populations containing a new panel of phenotypically diverse subpopulations that then reach stable proportions until the next selection pressure(s) is encountered.