Molecular Cytogenetic Characterization of the Human Cerebral Microvessel Endothelial Cell Line hCMEC/D3

The immortalized human cerebral microvessel endothelial cell line hCMEC/D3 has been repeatedly used as a model of human blood-brain barrier (BBB). hCMEC/D3 cells between passage 25 and 35 are most often applied in research, remained phenotypically nontransformed, and cells maintained many characteristics of human brain endothelial cells. Also hCMEC/D3 was thought to have conserved a normal diploid karyotype over all these passages. Here we characterized the cell line using high-resolution multicolor fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) approaches and revealed a complex karyotype in the 30th passage. Clonal cryptic unbalanced structural rearrangements and numerical aberrations were discovered and described as follows: 45 similar to 48,XX,-X,del(5)(q11)[2],del(9)(q11)[3],+9[3],del(11)(q13 similar to 14)[2],der(14)t(14;21)(q32.33;q22.3)[28],der(15)t(9;15)(p11;p11)[13],dup(15)(p11q11)[5],der(21)t(17;21)(p12;q22)[9],-22[6][cp28]. In summary, a complex karyotype with clonal unbalanced chromosomal rearrangements is present in hCMEC/D3. Thus, we solicit to include molecular cytogenetics in the testing of all cell lines prior to application of their use in complex studies. Copyright (C) 2009 S. Karger AG, Basel