Experimental Researches on Carcinogenesis or Tumorigenicity of MDCK Canine Kidney Cell(CKC) Lines and Analysis of Their Chromosome Karyotypes

The chromosomal number variations & structural aberrations of the MDCK cell line, primary feline or canine kidney cell(FKC or CKC) and Hela cell line were investigated and their karyotypes of conventional chromosome bands were analyzed. The carcinogenesis or tumorigenicity testing of these cell lines in about 232 nude mice and for colony formation in soft agarose and for haemagglutination under different concentration of plant lectins of these cells were carried out. Under the prerequisite that the incidence of cancer or tumor in negative-control nude mice inoculated subcutaneously with primary feline or canine kidney cell cultures purified in vitro at passage 3 was 0 (0/22) and 0 (0/10), respectively. The incidence of the progressively-growing malignant tumor(MT) in positive-control nude mice inoculated subcutaneously with Hela cell cultures of KB, X, or NM20/X strain was 10/10, 25/25 and 5/51, respectively. The results showed that the incidence of tumor in nude mice with tetrapioid YA strain of MDCK cell during 20 - 45 passages, with hypodiploid JB strain of MDCK cell on passage 25, with di-and hypoploid JC strain of MDCK cell during 2 - 15passages or with hypoploid M strain of MDCK cell during 9 - 27 passages was 28/58, 1/5, 4/18 and 0/31,respectively. The chromosomal analysis results showed that the ratio of difference in the rate of modal chromosome number between high (mcs + n) and lowest (mcs)passages was not more than 5 % - 15 % and the structure aberrations was generally 0 - 3%. These results proved that the genetic characteristics of chromosomal number of cell lines determines their tumorigenicity, but it is species-specific. MDCK line has tumorigenicity no matter what its chromosome karyotype is, at least it has very low tumorigenicity even when its modal chromosome number is hypoploid. The repeatedly frozen, thawed and split controls of tumorigenicity-positive cell lines(X strain of Hela, M strain of BHK-21, JA strain of Vero, YA strain of MDCK) have much lower tumorigenicity or are even non-carcinogenesis, and the repeatedly frozen, thawed and split controls of very low tumorigenicity cell lines (M or JC strain of MDCK) are certainly non-carcinogenic and never have increased tumorigenicity.It is thus evident that MDCK cell of M, JB or JC strain can be approved as substrate for the preparation of attenuated viral vaccines, but MDCK cell of YA strain can not be approved as substrate for the preparation of comattenuated viral vaccines. In summary, all strains of MDCK cell line have tunorigenicity, at least have low tumorigencity, never have non-cancinogenic MDCK, but very low tumorigenicity MDCK cell strains can certainly be used for the approval production of canine viral vaccines if the DNA content in viral cell cultures was remarkably decreased through conventional means in manufacturing process. Therefore, the master cell stock and working cell bank of MDCK line used for vaccine manufacture were established in China, which are free of infectious agents, and described with respect to cytogenetic characteristics and tumorigenicity. Tests showed that there were correlations among cell line chromosome number variations, anchorage independence in soft agarose, haemagglutination under plant lectins, and tumor-forming ability in nude mice, thus all the in vitro tests are economic, simple and reliable means for monitoring the tumor-forming ability of MDCK line in nude mice.