You are interested in epithelial tissue formation and work in a lab studying Mad

Question

You are interested in epithelial tissue formation and work in a lab studying Madin–Darby canine kidney (MDCK) cells. MDCK cells spontaneously form hollow epithelial vesicles. Staining these vesicles with an anti-actin antibody demonstrates the existence of apical microvilli near the central cavity of the vesicle. A new postdoctoral fellow in the lab comes to you in a panic. You had given her some dissociated MDCK cells that have been cultured as single cells in a collagen matrix. Because the cells did not look obviously polarized to her, she stained the dissociated MDCK cells to visualize the microvilli and she does not see any signs of polarized microvilli localization in these cells. Explain why you are confident that you did not give her the wrong cell line, and suggest a better experiment that will allow her to test whether the cells you gave her are MDCK cells. (10 points)

Explanation / Answer

The polarized epithelial cells start the process involving extracellular matrix and integrins that identify the basal pole. In unpolarized MDCK cells , the microtubules are nucleated by centromere and upon polarization the microtubules itnetwork is reorganized and the bulk microtubules runs parallel to basal polarity axis with minus ends underneath the apical surface.The horizontal network present underlying the apical surface where action organize to form apical microvilli. So dissociated MDCK cell line lacks polarity because of which the postdoctoral fellow unable to see microvilli.

The better methods used to identify MDCK cell are:

First, culturing of cells carefully without affecting the polarity however the new generation microscope allows easily to visualize the imaging of fluorescently tagged molecules.

Secondly, direct fluorescence technique can also be used to view the cell line.

Related Questions

Navigate

• Browse (All)
• Browse Y
• Subjects

Integrity-first tutoring: explanations and feedback only — we do not complete graded work. Learn more.