Establishment, characterization and drug sensitivity of a new anaplastic thyroid carcinoma cell line (BHT-101)

A thyroid carcinoma cell line, BHT-101, has been established in vitro from a metastatic lymph node deposit in a female patient with a non-hormone producing anaplastic, partly thyroglobulin- and thyroxine (T4)-positive papillary thyroid cancer. The cell population is heterogeneous, containing epithelial-like and fibroblast-like cells, and has a doubling time of 24 h. The cell line is polyploid with hypertetraploid predominance and the karyotype showed trisomies, tetrasomies, pentasomies as well as many marker chromosomes. The majority of the cells are negative or weakly positive for thyroglobulin and thyroxine and estrogen and progesterone receptors are present in the cells. BHT-101 cells produce tumours when injected into immunosuppressed CBA/Ca mice. The cells are sensitive to adriamycin, methotrexate and tamoxifen but not to methimazole (Favistan). The epithelial-like clone 1 and the fibroblast-like clone 3, isolated from the parental line, differed in drug sensitivity. This new cell line is suitable for studying the biology of thyroid carcinoma and for parallel in vivo and in vitro studies of drug activity against thyroid cancer.