Separation and characterization of epithelial cells from prostates and prostatic carcinomas: a review

Our investigation of normal, hyperplastic, and neoplastic prostatic tissue during the past 2 1/2 years has produced several findings which have been published or accepted for publication. (a) Cells from hamster prostates with intense histochemically demonstrable acid phosphatase activity (HDAP) after fixation with formaldehyde which we believe to be epithelial cells can be obtained in 97.2% +/- 0.8% purity by velocity sedimentation in a previously described isokinetic density gradient; (b) similarly, cells with HDAP, many of which contain lipofuscin granules, can be obtained as 81.0% +/- 12.2% of nucleated cells from hyperplastic human prostates and as 86.4% +/- 9.4% of nucleated cells from human prostatic carcinomas; (c) more cells were obtained from human hyperplastic prostates and prostates with prostatic carcinoma per gram of tissue with the aid of Pronase than were obtained with trypsin, collagenase, or mechanical methods; (d) more cells per gram of tissue were obtained from surgically removed prostates than from prostates obtained at even very rapid autopsies, and a much larger proportion of the cells from surgically removed prostates were viable as assessed both by dye exclusion and by plating efficiency; (e) none of several substrates and inhibitors which we tested were highly specific for acid phosphatase from purified prostatic epithelial cells compared with several other kinds of purified human cells; and (f) purified hamster prostatic epithelial cells incorporate large amounts of tritiated thymidine in 72-hour cultures.