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Updated: Aug 18, 2026

Cultivation of Mammalian Cells Using a Single-use Pneumatic Bioreactor System
Published on: October 10, 2014
Indefinite growth of mammalian cell autotrophs on amino acids, vitamins, and glucose
M Hill1, J Hillova, R Mariage-Samson
1Laboratory of Cellular and Molecular Biology, C.N.R.S., Institute of Cancer and Immunogenetics, Villejuif, France.
Abstract:
Established mammalian cells segregate variants, named autotrophs, able to proliferate in the absence of hormones and proteins of any kind. We provided complete formulas for autotrophic media composed of amino acids, vitamins, glucose, and inorganic salts only and showed that such media are sufficient to sustain continuous propagation of Chinese hamster fibroblasts and human keratinocytes. The cells grew on bare polystyrene and divided every 32 to 44 hours reaching approximately 8 x 10(5) cells/cm2. The results showed that the autotrophs may replace conventional cultures in most experimental and industrial cell production systems.
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