Human intestinal dendritic cell isolation

Cells with the morphology of veiled cells were first described in the human intestinal lamina propria in tissue obtained from patients suffering from inflammatory bowel diseases (1,2). These cells were found in greater numbers in inflamed bowel than in normal controls. The isolation of dendritic (DC) cells from human intestinal tissue is associated with many of the problems encountered in the mouse, for example, low cell numbers and the paucity of specific cell surface markers. Particular problems are encountered using human tissues. For example, human DC are fibronectin-adherent, at least in the short term (3), so this property does not permit their separation from macrophages. In addition, the function and viability of human peripheral blood dendritic cells appears to be sensitive to the toxic effects of complement (4). The purest populations of human DC are obtained by sophisticated techniques, including cell sorting by negative selection using a broad range of monoclonal antibodies (5,6).