Abstract
Continuous cell cultivation was tried on the surgical biopsy specimens from 40 clinical brain tumor cases and only one long-termed culture was obtained from a case of astrocytoma. The culture has so far been maintained 39 passages for 297 days and showed a pseudo-diploid character which consistently had three marker chromosomes. As a reference experiment, normal diploid cells were isolated from the cerebellar cortex of a human embryo and maintained in vitro. By comparison with this reference experiment in culture history, growth characteristics and chromosome constitution, it was strongly suggested that the long-termed culture has established a cell line. As to the drug sensitivity, the cells in the long-termed culture were more sensitive to Vinblastine than the normal cells in vitro, while both the cells had a similar sensitivity to Japanese encephalitis virus.
