Method for production of neuronal hybridoma using emetine and actinomycin D

Neuronal hybrid cells established by somatic cell fusion are useful for studies of neuronal properties at the molecular level (Hammond, D.N., Lee, H.J., Tonsgard, J.H. and Wainer, B.H., Development and characterization of clonal cell lines derived from septal cholinergic neurons, Brain Res., 512 (1990) 190-200; Wainwright, M.S., Perry, B.D., Won, L.A., O'Malley, K.L., Wang, W.Y., Ehrlich, M.E. and Heller, A., Immortalized murine strial neuronal cell lines expressing dopamine receptors and cholinergic properties, J. Neurosci., 15 (1995) 676-688). The somatic cell fusion method requires a fusion partner which is unable to survive in the selection medium if it does not fuse with primary cells to isolate the hybrid cells. Hypoxanthine guanine phosphoribosyltransferase (HPRT)-deficient partner cells and hypoxanthine, aminopterin and thymidine (HAT) selection medium are commonly used for this procedure (Harlow, E. and Lane, D. (Eds.), Antibodies: a Laboratory Manual, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Publications, New York, 1988, pp. 139-243). The present method requires neither HPRT-deficient cells nor HAT medium. Primary neurons are fused with the C1300 neuroblastoma cells pretreated with emetine (Grollman, A.P., Inhibitors of protein biosynthesis, J. Biol. Chem., 243 (1968) 4089-4094), an inhibitor of ribosomes and actinomycin D (Perry, R.P., Selective effects of actinomycin D on the intracellular distribution of RNA synthesis in tissue culture cells, Exp. Cell Res., 29 (1963) 400-406), an inhibitor of ribosomal RNA (rRNA) synthesis, before fusion. By this treatment, we are able to isolate hybrid cells after fusion because non-fused C1300 cells die due to the loss of active ribosomes and protein synthesis, whereas C1300 cells fusing with primary cells survive due to the supply of intact ribosomes and rRNA from primary cells. This method produces neuronal hybrids at high efficiency.