4T1 is a

breast cancer Breast cancer is cancer that develops from breast tissue. Signs of breast cancer may include a lump in the breast, a change in breast shape, dimpling of the skin, milk rejection, fluid coming from the nipple, a newly inverted nipple, or a re ...

cell line An immortalised cell line is a population of cells from a multicellular organism which would normally not proliferate indefinitely but, due to mutation, have evaded normal cellular senescence and instead can keep undergoing division. The cell ...

derived from the

mammary gland A mammary gland is an exocrine gland in humans and other mammals that produces milk to feed young offspring. Mammals get their name from the Latin word ''mamma'', "breast". The mammary glands are arranged in organs such as the breasts in primat ...

tissue of a

mouse A mouse ( : mice) is a small rodent. Characteristically, mice are known to have a pointed snout, small rounded ears, a body-length scaly tail, and a high breeding rate. The best known mouse species is the common house mouse (''Mus musculus' ...

BALB/c BALB/c is an albino, laboratory-bred strain of the house mouse from which a number of common substrains are derived. Now over 200 generations from New York in 1920, BALB/c mice are distributed globally, and are among the most widely used inbred ...

strain. 4T1 cells are

epithelial Epithelium or epithelial tissue is one of the four basic types of animal tissue, along with connective tissue, muscle tissue and nervous tissue. It is a thin, continuous, protective layer of compactly packed cells with a little intercellula ...

and are resistant to

6-thioguanine Tioguanine, also known as thioguanine or 6-thioguanine (6-TG) is a medication used to treat acute myeloid leukemia (AML), acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL), and chronic myeloid leukemia (CML). Long-term use is not recommended. It is given by mouth. ...

. In preclinical research, 4T1 cells have been used to study breast cancer

metastasis Metastasis is a pathogenic agent's spread from an initial or primary site to a different or secondary site within the host's body; the term is typically used when referring to metastasis by a cancerous tumor. The newly pathological sites, then, ...

as they can metastasize to the lung, liver, lymph nodes, brain and bone. The cells are known to be highly aggressive in live tissues.

History

4T1 cell line was originally isolated by Fred Miller and colleagues as one of four sublines derived from the 410.4 tumor that was isolated from a single spontaneously arising mammary tumor.

Characteristics

4T1 resembles human metastatic

triple-negative breast cancer Triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) is any breast cancer that lacks or show low levels of estrogen receptor (ER), progesterone receptor (PR) and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) overexpression and/or gene amplification (i.e. the tum ...

(TNBC) in lack of the expression of estrogen receptor (ER), progesterone receptor (PR), and epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2). In addition, it was described, that this cell line is poorly immunogenic in mice, which corresponds to the characteristics of human mammary

adenocarcinoma Adenocarcinoma (; plural adenocarcinomas or adenocarcinomata ) (AC) is a type of cancerous tumor that can occur in several parts of the body. It is defined as neoplasia of epithelial tissue that has glandular origin, glandular characteristics, or ...

and leads to the higher tumorigenicity and invasiveness of this breast cancer model.

Application

To understand the pathogenesis of cancer patients, it is necessary to have model systems that faithfully mimic this condition. The application of a murine cancer cell line, such as 4T1, in a mouse model is of great value for preclinical TNBC studies. The 4T1 cell line is widely used as a syngeneic model for human triple-negative breast cancer, which is responsible for more than 17% of breast cancers diagnosed worldwide each year. 4T1 cells can be transplanted into the

fat pad A fat pad (aka haversian gland) is a mass of closely packed fat cells surrounded by fibrous tissue septa.TheFreeDictionary > Fat padCiting: Mosby's Medical Dictionary, 8th edition. 2009 They may be extensively supplied with capillaries and nerve end ...

of the murine mammary gland, where they are highly tumorigenic, invasive, and spontaneously metastasize to distant organs such as the lungs, liver, lymph nodes, brain, and bone.

Cultivation

4T1 cells grow in 37 °C with 95% air and 5% of

carbon dioxide Carbon dioxide (chemical formula ) is a chemical compound made up of molecules that each have one carbon atom covalently double bonded to two oxygen atoms. It is found in the gas state at room temperature. In the air, carbon dioxide is transpar ...

(). Their average doubling time is 14 hours. The base medium for this cell line is RPMI-1640 Medium with a

fetal bovine serum Fetal bovine serum (FBS) is derived from the blood drawn from a bovine fetus via a closed system of collection at the slaughterhouse. Fetal bovine serum is the most widely used serum-supplement for the in vitro cell culture of eukaryotic cells. Th ...

in a final concentration of 10%. 4T1 cells should not be allowed to become 100% confluent. Subculturing at 80% confluence is recommended. For detaching the cells from the surface, rinsing with 0.25%

trypsin Trypsin is an enzyme in the first section of the small intestine that starts the digestion of protein molecules by cutting these long chains of amino acids into smaller pieces. It is a serine protease from the PA clan superfamily, found in the dig ...

-0.53mM

EDTA Ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA) is an aminopolycarboxylic acid with the formula H2N(CH2CO2H)2sub>2. This white, water-soluble solid is widely used to bind to iron (Fe2+/Fe3+) and calcium ions (Ca2+), forming water-soluble complexes eve ...

solution at room temperature is used. Complete growth medium 95% with

DMSO Dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) is an organosulfur compound with the formula ( CH3)2. This colorless liquid is the sulfoxide most widely used commercially. It is an important polar aprotic solvent that dissolves both polar and nonpolar compounds an ...

5% is used as a freezing medium and cells are stored at

liquid nitrogen Liquid nitrogen—LN2—is nitrogen in a liquid state at low temperature. Liquid nitrogen has a boiling point of about . It is produced industrially by fractional distillation of liquid air. It is a colorless, low viscosity liquid that is wide ...

vapor phase temperature.

Variants

References

{{Reflist

External links

Cellosaurus entry for 4T1
Rodent cell lines