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In Vitro Assays Used to Analyse Vascular Cell Functions

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Fundamentals of Vascular Biology

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Abstract

The usage, treatment, and analyses of isolated primary vascular cells or immortalized vascular cell lines in basic science studies are highly favourable as these techniques provide a system for fast and direct functional evaluation of cellular processes. These processes can include physiological signalling pathways, pathological disease-associated changes, as well as toxicity/pharmacological tests. Based on the architecture of the vascular wall, this chapter addresses in vitro assays using endothelial cells, smooth muscle cells, and fibroblasts. According to their physiological environment, these cells require different cell culture conditions mostly regulated by various cell culture media. For different functional test also the mimicking of the in vivo situation, e.g. culture under flow conditions or co-culture of different cell types. The in vitro assays discussed in this chapter are sorted by physiological function and corresponding cell types. Herein, we also explain how these assays can be used to determine cell biological changes associated with relevant vascular pathologies. The majority of the described assays are based on the 2D culture of cells. As 3D cultures are much better suited to mimic the in vivo situation in many cases, this chapter also includes a description of recent developments in 3D culture assay and techniques. As an extension of 3D culture towards in vivo, we also describe the usage of in vitro cultured vascular tissue as model systems to study vascular function at the end of this chapter.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Laboratory Medicine, University Hospital, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Munich, Germany

    Adrian Türkcan

  2. Medical Faculty, Center for Medical Research, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Linz, Austria

    David Bernhard

  3. Department of Surgery, Cardiac Surgery Research Laboratory, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria

    Barbara Messner

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  1. Adrian Türkcan
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Correspondence to Barbara Messner .

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  1. Department of Vascular Biology and Thrombosis Research, Center for Physiology and Pharmacology, Medical University of Vienna, Wien, Austria

    Margarethe Geiger

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Türkcan, A., Bernhard, D., Messner, B. (2019). In Vitro Assays Used to Analyse Vascular Cell Functions. In: Geiger, M. (eds) Fundamentals of Vascular Biology. Learning Materials in Biosciences. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-12270-6_15

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