Autonomous growth of BALB/MK keratinocytes transfected with a retroviral vector carrying the human epidermal growth factor gene

• Autor(a) principal: Choudhuri, Jomuna Veronica [UNIFESP]
• Data de Publicação: 2008
• Outros Autores: Mathor, Monica B., Silva, Flavia H. [UNIFESP], Han, Sang Won [UNIFESP]
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Institucional da UNIFESP
• Texto Completo: http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S1415-47572008005000009; http://repositorio.unifesp.br/handle/11600/30250
• topic: BALB/MK keratinocytes; epidermal growth factor; retroviral vector

Epidermal growth factor (EGF), which promotes epidermal regeneration and wound closure, is important for the proliferation and differentiation of epidermal and epithelial tissues in animals. Exogenous EGF is a promising therapeutic agent for wound healing, but its general use is restricted by the limited availability of this protein. in this work, we show that the transfection of mouse BALB/MK keratinocytes, which are totally dependent on EGF for growth and migration, with mature cDNA for human EGF via a retroviral vector abolished the cells requirement for exogenous EGF. the transformed cells had normal morphology and a growth rate that varied according to the source of the retroviral vector used. Keratinocyte transfection with EGF cDNA provides a time- and cost-efficient means of culturing keratinocytes and yields cells that may be useful for skin grafting.