RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CHROMOSOMAL CHANGES AND ALTERATIONS IN THE BEHAVIOUR OF A STRAIN OF HUMAN SYNOVIAL CELLS DURING ITS LIFE HISTORY IN VITRO BY

The eventual occurrence of gross aberrations in the number and pattern of chromosomes is one o the main objections to the use of cell cultures in the study of physiology and disease. Such aberrations are essential features of the permanent cell lines such as HeLa, and accompany the phenomenon of "trans-formation", in which radical changes occur in cell structure, growth, and secretory functions. Trans-formation to "established " cell lines is commonly observed in cells from healthy rat and mouse tissues growing in vitro (Levan and Biesele, 1958; Rothfels and Parker, 1959). Several examples have been recorded of similar transformations in cells pro-pagated from human neoplasms (Gey, Coffman, and Kubicek, 1952; Fjelde, 1955; Berman, Stulberg, and Ruddle, 1957). In contrast, transformation rarely occurs in cells from "normal " human tissues and these can often be grown for considerable periods in continuous serial cultivation without serious devia-tions from the euploid state (Puck, Cieciura, an