Introduction
With each successive pregnancy, the mammary gland completes a cycle of growth, functional differentiation and involution. These processes are of great importance in biology in their own right, but they also provide an example of how proliferation, differentiation and apoptosis are integrated into the organization of a complex three-dimensional tissue unit, whose function changes with time. The growth and development of ductal and alveolar structures during pregnancy is dependent on the interaction between the epithelial cells and stromal components of the mammary fat pad and requires the concerted actions of both peptide and steroid hormones, and cell-cell and cell-substratum interactions [
1]. The necessity for these complex structural and hormonal interactions provide a challenge for the development of
in vitro models for molecular studies that accurately mimic the differentiation and death of mammary epithelial cells.
A variety of mammary culture systems have been developed to facilitate studies on the regulation of gene transcription in the mammary gland. Whole organ and explant cultures have been of value in identifying the role of specific hormones in both the growth and differentiation of mammary tissue and the induction of milk protein gene expression [
2]. These cultures have a limited lifespan, however, and are not useful for studies at the cellular level. Epithelial cells can be isolated from mammary tissue, maintained in culture and induced to differentiate with lactogenic hormones. The use of such primary cultures has demonstrated the importance of the cellular substratum in the differentiation process [
3]. A major drawback of this system, in addition to the short lifespan of the cells, is the considerable amount of starting material required.
Spontaneously immortalized cell lines have arisen from prolonged culture of primary epithelial cells in low serum (2%). Many of these established mammary epithelial cell lines have proved to be useful tools in molecular and bio-chemical studies. They include EpH4 cells [
4] and the COMMA-1D cell line, one of the most widely used
in vitro mammary systems, which exhibits mammary-specific functional differentiation when exposed to lactogenic hormones and extracellular matrix (ECM) [
5]. Subclones of COMMA-1D include HC11 and CID9 [
6,
7]. HC11 cells have been widely used by us, and others, for studies on transcriptional regulation of milk protein gene expression [
8,
9], whereas CID9 cells have been extensively used to demonstrate the role of ECM in milk protein gene expression [
7]. Furthermore, a pure epithelial population, SCp2, has been derived from CID9 [
10].
In our laboratory, we are particularly interested in the signalling pathways that regulate gene expression in the differentiating and involuting mouse mammary gland. Despite the undoubted value of these culture systems, expression of transgenes in vivo does not always recapitulate expression observed in culture. This reflects the complex requirements for mammary epithelial cell differentiation and apoptosis. There is a need, therefore, for mammary epithelial cell lines that more accurately mimic the developing and involuting gland. Such cells should preferably be immortalized by a conditional (ie reversible) mechanism (in contrast to currently available lines) and be able to be genetically modified.
In order to achieve this, we adopted a modification of the procedure used to generate 'immortomouse', a line of transgenic mice that harbour a temperature-sensitive variant of an immortalizing gene, SV40 T-Ag, which is expressed from a constitutive promoter H2K
b [
11]. Although the 'immortomouse' shows thymic hyperplasia, these transgenic mice undergo normal development and have proven to be a useful source of material to establish cell lines from tissues that have previously been refractory to culturing [
12]. Our attempts to establish mammary epithelial lines from these mice were unsuccessful, however. This may be due to insufficient levels of T-Ag being expressed in the mammary epithelial compartment to immortalize these cells or the presence of T-Ag in the other mammary compartments, thereby allowing the preferential immortalization of fibroblasts and other stromal cell types.
We therefore decided to refine this approach and target expression of the thermolabile T-Ag mutant specifically to the mammary epithelium of transgenic mice. Targeted expression can be achieved using either the mouse mammary tumour virus long terminal repeats or a milk protein gene promoter. We chose to use the promoter of the sheep milk protein gene encoding β-lactoglobulin (BLG), because BLG is less dependant than WAP on the transgene genomic integration site for its expression [
13] BLG transgenes are expressed at low levels in the mammary glands of virgin mice, whereas expression is regulated during pregnancy and lactation with a similar expression profile to that of β-casein [
14]. Therefore, it is likely that BLG expression occurs in dividing cells early in the differentiation pathway, a critical factor in establishing cultures from early stages of mammary gland development. Such cultures could contain epithelial stem cells because these are known to be distributed throughout the ductal tree [
15]. We report herein the isolation and characterization of a stable line of mammary epithelial cells, named KIM-2, from mid-pregnant mammary glands of one line of mice with a low transgene copy number. Importantly, this cell line has a phenotypically normal epithelial morphology at 37°C and permits the analysis of the complex processes of differentiation and apoptosis
in vitro. Moreover, we provide evidence that this line is susceptible to genetic manipulation, thus making available a resource for analysis of genetic function.
Materials and methods
Construction of the transgene
A fusion gene, consisting of 4.2 kb of the 5
'-flanking promoter sequences, including the transcriptional start site, of the ovine BLG gene [
16] and the temperature-sensitive variant of SV40 T-Ag (tsA58) coding sequences [
11], was constructed.
The 4.2 kb Sall/EcoRV fragment of the BLG promoter was isolated from pBJ39 (provided by Dr CBA Whitelaw) and subcloned into pBluescript vector (Stratagene Europe, Amsterdam, The Netherlands). A 3.9 kb Bgll fragment was isolated from pUC tsA58 [
11], blunt ended using T4 DNA polymerase and digested with BamHI, and a 2.7 kb fragment containing sequences encoding large and small T-Ag was purified. This fragment was fused to the EcoRV site of the BLG promoter.
Generation and identification of transgenic mice
For microinjection the transgene was isolated free of vector sequences by double digestion with Sall and Xbal, and the transgene was purified by agarose gel electrophoresis. DNA (1.5 ng/μl) was microinjected into pronuclear mouse eggs (collected from C57BL/6 ×CBA F1 mice after mating with F1 male studs) in order to generate transgenic mice. Lines were maintained by mating F1 mice that harboured the transgene, as determined by polymerase chain reaction analysis of tail biopsies [
17]. All DNA manipulations were carried out using standard procedures [
18].
DNA analysis
DNA was extracted from tail biopsies of 6-weeks-old mice, and analyzed by polymerase chain reaction and Southern blots. Genomic tail DNA was digested with an appropriate restriction enzyme, subjected to agarose gel electrophoresis and transferred to nylon membrane (Hybond N; Amersham Pharmacia Biotech, Uppsala, Sweden) [
19]. Southern blots were hybridized [
20] with a random oligoprimed probe (Prime-It II kit; Stratagene) [
21] containing sequences from the probe 1 region of the transgene.
RNA analysis
RNA was extracted from tissue or from cultured cells using the acid guanidium thiocyanate-phenol chloroform method [
22]. For northern blot analysis, 10 μg total RNA was resolved on 1.0% formaldehyde agarose gels, transferred to nylon membranes (Hybond N; Amersham) and hybridized to [
32P] dCTP-labelled random primed probes. Two probes were used for β-casein [
23] and WAP [
24].
Explant cultures
Mammary glands were aseptically removed from a midpregnant (day 14) transgenic mouse carrying the BLG/SV40 T-Ag construct and washed several times in dissection medium (HEPES-buffered M199 with gentamycin at 50 μg/ml and BRL's antibiotic/antimycotic solution; Gibco/BRL, Paisley, Scotland). The tissue was cut with scalpels into pieces of about 1 mm thickness in fresh dissection medium; seeded into collagen type I-coated flasks; and cultured at either the permissive temperature of 33°C or the semipermissive temperature of 37°C for about 2 weeks with daily medium changes (1 ml/25 cm2) in serum-free F12/Dulbecco's modified eagle's medium (1:1), supplemented with bovine insulin, ovine prolactin, cortisol, oestradiol (each 5 μg/ml) and epidermal growth factor (EGF; 10 ng/ml). During this period, an epithelial outgrowth formed around most explants, without fibroblast contamination. Explants were removed by simply shaking them off and washing the flask, and the culture was continued in F12/Dulbecco's modified eagle's medium (1:1) supplemented with 10% foetal calf serum, 5 μg/ml insulin, 10 ng/ml EGF, 5 μg/ml linoleic acid and 5 μg/ml gentamycin.
Primary cultures were passaged after several weeks when the circumference of the islands stopped growing. Cells were passaged as clumps of about five to 10 cells rather than as single cells, because this appeared to aid survival and maintenance of the epithelial phenotype. In order to produce clumps, trypsinization was shortened and performed at room temperature, the cells scraped off with a cell scraper, and the cell suspension handled with widebore pipettes. Cells are now routinely cultured at 37°C and passaged every three to four days at a 1:4 ratio onto collagen-coated flasks (growth on collagen once in every five passages is sufficient) and maintained for approximately 20 passages. No change in phenotype is observed with careful handling.
Immunocytochemistry
Cells were grown subconfluently on collagen-coated glass coverslips in four-well plates or on plastic slide flasks (Nunc/Nalge Europe, Hereford, UK). The cells were fixed in methanol:acetone for 10 min, washed with Tris-buffered saline (TBS) pH 7.6, blocked in TBS+ 20% goat serum for 1 h, and then immunostained with a panel of primary antibodies. Monoclonal antibodies to cytokeratin 18 and 19 were from EB Lane and SV40 T-Ag antibodies were kindly provided by Dr DP Lane (Department of Biochemistry, University of Dundee, Dundee, UK). Murine smooth muscle actin antibody was obtained from Sigma (A2547) as were E-cadherin (U 3254), laminin (L9393) and vimentin (V5255) (Sigma-Aldrich, Gillingham, Dorset, UK). Rat monoclonal antibody to zonula occluden-1 (MAB1520) was from Hemicon (Chemicon International Inc, Temecula, CA, USA). Antibody binding was visualized with fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC)-labelled secondary antibodies (Sigma). Images were analyzed by fluorescence microscopy and, in some cases, phase and fluorescence images were subsequently merged.
Electron microscopy
Differentiated cells were trypsinized, centrifuged and fixed in 3% glutaraldehyde in 0.1 mol/l sodium cacodylate/HCI buffer of pH 7.2-7.4 at 4°C for 48 h. After washing with distilled water (dH2O) for 20 min, the samples underwent secondary fixation in 1% osmium tetroxide in dH2O for 45 min at room temperature. Samples were then dehydrated with methylated spirits and absolute ethanol, before linking to propylene oxide for 10 min and impregnation in Emix resin (Fisons, Leicester, UK) overnight at room temperature. After polymerization for 18-24 h at 70°C, 90-nm sections were mounted on 300-mesh copper grids and stained using the uranyl acetate/lead citrate method. Finally, sections were examined and photographs taken using a Jeol 100CXXII transmission electron microscope (Jeol Ltd, Welwyn Garden City, Herts, UK).
Induction of milk protein gene expression
Cells were grown on plastic-coated or collagen-coated flasks in growth medium until confluent. After 2 days, hormone induction media was then added, consisting of growth medium without EGF supplemented with dexamethasone and ovine prolactin. Cultures were induced for up to 12 days with media changes every 2 days.
Western blot analysis
In order to detect casein in total cell extracts, cells (area 8 cm2) were washed in phosphate-buffered saline and lysed directly in 0.5 ml electrophoresis sample buffer (0.125 mol/l Tris HCI pH 6.8, 2% sodium dodecyl sulphate, 2% β-2-mercaptoethanol, 10% glycerol), shearing the DNA by repetitive pipetting, boiled for 10 min and stored at-20°C. The protein concentrations of the samples were determined using the BCA Protein Assay Reagent kit (Pierce and Warriner, Chester, UK).
One dimensional sodium dodecyl sulphate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis was performed as described by Laemmli [
25] in 15% polyacrylamide gels with a 3% stacking gel. Proteins were transferred from gels to nitrocellulose filters (Schleicher and Schuell, London, UK) at a current of 0.8 mA/cm
2 for 1 h using a semidry electroblotter [
26]. After blocking nonspecific binding with 1% bovine serum albumin in phosphate-buffered saline/Tween (0.1%), the nitrocellulose was exposed to a polyclonal rabbit antimouse β-casein antibody diluted 1:10 000 in blocking solution. Primary antibodies were visualized by peroxidase-conjugated anti-lg antibodies and ECL detection reagents (Amersham).
Electrophoretic mobility shift assays
Electrophoretic mobility shift assays were carried out using the highest affinity STAT binding site (STM) in the BLG promoter, as previously described [
8]. Briefly, 4 μg protein from nuclear extracts were incubated with
32P-labelled STM oligonucleotide in binding buffer, and analyzed on 6% native acrylamide gels, followed by autoradiography.
Acridine orange staining and fluorescence microscopy
KIM-2 cells were grown to confluency, washed in phosphate-buffered saline and incubated in Dulbecco's modified eagle's medium/F12 containing 3% serum (but no additional growth factors) for 48 h. Cells (1×106) were fixed in 70% ethanol and stained with acridine orange (5 μg/ml; Molecular Probes Europe BV, Leiden, The Netherlands). Classical features of apoptosis were identified with fluorescence microscopy.
Flow cytometry and annexin V assay
Undifferentiated cells
KIM-2 cells were grown as above and 24 h later cells from the supernatant and monolayer were harvested. Cells (1×105) were stained with annexin V and propidium iodide using the Apoptosis Detection Kit and following the manufacturer's instructions (R&D Systems, Abingdon, Oxford, UK). Cells were analyzed by flow cytometry using a Coulter EPICS XL flow cytometer (Beckman Coulter, High Wycombe, Bucks, UK). Debris and clumps were gated out using forward and orthogonal light scatter. Green fluorescence (525 nm; FITC annexin V) and red fluorescence (613 nm; propidium iodide) of 2000 cells was measured. The experiment was repeated three times.
Differentiated cells
KIM-2 cells were differentiated for 12 days with the lactogenic hormones insulin, dexamethasone and prolactin. Apoptosis was induced by removal of these hormones and measured 17 h later, as above.
Discussion
The morphological changes that take place during a mammary gland developmental cycle have been well defined and characterized. However, the molecular mechanisms that are involved in the regulation of lobuloalveolar development during pregnancy and the removal of this compartment by apoptosis during involution are just beginning to be understood, partly because it has been difficult to obtain a suitable in vitro model system that accurately mimics mammary gland development. The aim of this work was to establish a mammary cell culture system that would be of value in biochemical and functional studies of the control of differentiation and apoptosis.
To achieve this aim, we adapted the approach developed by Jat
et al [
11] and derived a mammary-specific 'immortomouse' using the BLG milk protein milk promoter to drive expression of a temperature-sensitive allelle of SV40 large T-Ag. We also developed a novel culture system to enrich for luminal epithelial cells. These procedures allowed us to successfully derive a novel line of conditionally immortal mammary epithelial cells. These cells retain a stable phenotype that is characteristic of luminal epithelial cells at the normal growth temperature of 37°C as evidenced by immunocytochemical analysis using lineage specific markers. At 39°C, the cells are not immortal and die within a few passages.
The growth characteristics of the KIM-2 cell strain were dramatically influenced by the culture temperature. Isolating epithelial cells at the permissive temperature of 33°C resulted in apparently transformed cells with a spindle morphology that form colonies in soft agar. This phenotype cannot be reverted by switching up the growth temperature to 37°C. Switching down the growth temperature from 37°C to 33°C, however, caused a gradual change in morphology from cuboidal epithelial to a more fibroblastic appearance over a period of several weeks. Immunocytochemical analysis of these cells revealed the presence of vimentin and α-actin, along with keratin 18, suggesting that conversion of the epithelial cells to a more fibroblastic or myoepithelial cell type had taken place. After a switch down in growth temperature from 37°C to 33°C for 48 h or more, the phenotypic switch became irreversible.
Of the 13 transgenic founder lines generated, the lowest copy number line SV40-2 was used as the source of mammary cells for these experiments. Surprisingly, expression of T-Ag RNA in the mammary glands of line SV40-2 mice was barely detectable by northern blot analysis (data not shown), although T-Ag could be detected by western blot (Fig.
2a), suggesting that the BLG promoter is dysregulated when fused to T-Ag sequences. The reason for this is not clear but it may be a consequence of the integration site of the transgene and the lack of sequences from within the body of the BLG gene and/or in its 3
'-terminal end, which confer integration site independence [
40]. Whatever the mechanism, the low levels of T-Ag messenger RNA encode sufficient protein for the immortalizing role of SV40 T-Ag, which is readily detectable in the nuclei of cells in culture (Fig.
5b). The low expression of T-Ag may explain our observation that no mammary tumours were found, even in the animals that developed tumours at ectopic sites. Ectopic expression of BLG transgenes has been observed previously and high levels of T-Ag mRNA were found in the tumours.
KIM-2 cells have a characteristic epithelial morphology. Immunocytochemical analysis demonstrated the presence of the luminal-specific marker keratin 18 in the majority of the cells and the absence of fibroblastic markers. Some myoepithelial cells were observed that were characterized by their elongated morphology and positive staining with antibodies to α-actin. These cells were frequently found to be associated with the dome-like structures that formed in response to lactogenic hormone induction (Fig.
7) and may suggest that both cell types are necessary for the formation of these alveolar-like structures. We have derived a substantial number of clonal lines from KIM-2 cells by transfection of selectable markers. These clonal derivatives also form dome structures and have a myoepithelial component suggesting that KIM-2 cells are a progenitor of both luminal and myoepithelial cells. Selective growth of these cell types [
37] would provide a resource for the discovery of genes, using microarray technology, which are expressed specifically in one type of cell [
41]. The exciting possibility that KIM-2 cells may be stem cells will be tested by their ability to repopulate a cleared mammary fat pad. If this is successful, genetically modified KIM-2 cells could be used to generate transgenic mammary glands [
42].
The formation of cell-cell contacts was investigated by using antibodies to E-cadherin and zonula occluden-1 and by electron microscopy. Staining at cell contacts was observed for both E-cadherin and zonula occluden-1 (Fig.
7). The formation of structures resembling desmosomes was seen by electron microscopy, and the presence of microvilli on the apical surfaces of cell clusters suggests that the cells are polarized, which is a feature of alveolar cells
in vivo. The synthesis and deposition of laminin by KIM-2 cells that we have observed may be essential for polarization in addition to cell-cell contact.
Polarization is also essential for the expression and secretion of milk proteins. We showed previously that growth on ECM (principally laminin) is necessary for the activation of STAT5 in response to prolactin in primary cultures [
43]. It is likely, therefore, that the synthesis and deposition of laminin by KIM-2 cells provides the necessary extracellular signals for the activation of sufficient levels of STAT5 for induction of full differentiation. Indeed, it has been shown that the binding of STAT5 to the WAP promoter is essential for maximal expression [
44]. It is likely that STAT5 is a survival factor for differentiated mammary epithelial cells, and this is currently being tested.
Undifferentiated KIM-2 cells can be induced to undergo apoptosis by the removal of growth factors in serum. Apoptosis is extensive and rapid with approximately 30% of undifferentiated cells dying after 24 h. More relevantly, apoptosis can be induced in fully differentiated KIM-2 cells after removal of lactogenic hormones. Apoptosis has been studied in a variety of mouse mammary epithelial cell lines. KIM-2 cells are an important addition to this repertoire, because they exhibit different features. Differentiated cells do not require addition of exogenous basement membrane for survival (unlike CID9 cells, which die with delayed kinetics in the absence of basement membrane [
45]) and have wild-type p53 (unlike HC11 cells, which harbour mutant p53 allelles [
46]). Apoptosis in individual cells can be observed using fluorescence microscopy, and this can be coupled with detection of other markers such as green fluorescent protein reporter constructs [
36]. Thus, the KIM-2 cell line will be of value in future studies on early transcription events in the apoptotic process.
The low copy number line of BLG/SV40tsT mice can be crossed with other mice that harbouring either transgenes or gene deletions, thereby allowing the isolation of mammary cell lines from interesting mouse mutants. This will allow us to establish cell lines from knockout mice and should be invaluable for transfection studies that are aimed at identifying functional domains and interactions between signalling pathways in mammary epithelium.
Acknowledgements
We thank the staff of the SAU for excellent husbandry, Roberta Wallace for microinjections, Frank Donnelly for help with electron microscopy, Tom Burdon for advice and comments, Andrew Wyllie for his enthusiastic support and Mina Bissell for encouragement and inspiration. This work was supported by the BBSRC Stem Cell Molecular Biology Programme, The Cancer Research Campaign, the Cunningham Trust, the Home Office and the Association for International Cancer Research. Kathreena Kurian is an Edinburgh University Medical Faculty Research Fellow.