Establishment and Characteristics of Immortal Goat Endometrial Epithelial Cells and Stromal Cells with hTERT

The endometrial cell has important use in study of local endocrine-immunoregulatory of uterus in vitro. However, the primary cells were limited by the scarcity of adequate material and the finite lifespan. To establish immortal endometrial cells, the human Telomerase Reverse Transcriptase (hTERT) gene was introduced into primary goat Endometrial Epithelial Cells (EECs) and Endometrial Stromal Cells (ESCs) and obtained two immortalized cell lines, hTERT-EECs and hTERT-ESCs. After hTERT introduction, the biological characteristics of these cells were detected and compared with the primary cells. The results showed that the immortalized hTERT-EECs and hTERT-ESCs retained common cellular characteristics such as morphology, anchorage requirement, contact inhibition and serum-dependence. Their growth covers accorded to the normal growth regularity. The Keratin and Vinmentin were also detected. In addition, these cells possessed normal diploid karyotype, retained responsiveness to sex-steroid hormones and lacked transformed phenotypes on soft agar or in nude mice. In short, the immortalized goat endometrial cell lines (hTERT-EECs and hTERT-ESCs) had been developed what were karyotypically, morphologically and phenotypically similar to the primary parent cells. To date, hTERT-EECs had been passaged for 60 times and hTERT-ESCs for 65 and they would be convenient and consistent resources for in vitro research.