Serial passaging and differentiation of myogenic cells isolated from dystrophic mouse muscle

THE muscular dystrophies are a group of hereditary disorders manifested by a progressive wasting of the skeletal muscles. In spite of extensive studies, the nature of the primary lesion is unknown (for review see ref. 1). Because of the complex interaction between tissues, it is difficult to study this question in vivo. Therefore attempts have been made to investigate this question in cultures of dystrophic muscles of human or animal origin. Tissue explants as well as monolayer primary cell cultures contain, in addition to the myogenic cells, a heterogeneous cell population, the composition of which might differ in normal and dystrophic muscle cultures. It is difficult in such experiments to distinguish between properties intrinsic to the myogenic cells and effects exerted by other cell types. Indeed, previous experiments have yielded conflicting conclusions2–6. We therefore tested the possibility of obtaining cell cultures consisting of pure populations of myogenic cells obtained from dystrophic muscles. The present report describes the isolation of a cloned population of such cells, derived from adult dystrophic mouse muscle, that can proliferate and differentiate in cell culture.