Phagocytosis by stroma confounds co-culture studies

Herbst, S. A.; Stolarczyk, M.; Becirovic, T.; Liu, Y.; Kolb, C.; Herling, M.; Müller-Tidow, C.; Dietrich, S.

doi:10.1101/2020.12.11.417923

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bioRxiv · 10.1101/2020.12.11.417923

Phagocytosis by stroma confounds co-culture studies

Herbst, S. A.·Stolarczyk, M.·Becirovic, T.·Liu, Y.·Kolb, C.·Herling, M.·Müller-Tidow, C.·Dietrich, S.

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Abstract

Signals provided by the microenvironment can modify and circumvent pathway activities that are therapeutically targeted by drugs. Bone marrow stromal cell co-culture models are frequently used to study the influence of the bone marrow niche on ex-vivo drug response. Here we show that mesenchymal stromal cells from selected donors and NKTert, a stromal cell line which is commonly used for co-culture studies with primary leukemia cells, extensively phagocytose apoptotic cells. This could lead to misinterpretation of the results, especially if the viability readout of the target cells in such co-culture models is based on the relative proportions of dead and alive cells. Future co-culture studies which aim to investigate the impact of bone marrow stromal cells on drug response should take into account that stromal cells have the capacity to phagocytose apoptotic cells.

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Herbst, S. A., Stolarczyk, M., Becirovic, T., Liu, Y., Kolb, C., Herling, M., Müller-Tidow, C., Dietrich, S.. 2020-12-11. Phagocytosis by stroma confounds co-culture studies. https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.12.11.417923

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