Culture Models for Studying Thyroid Biology and Disorders
Figure 4
Scheme of thyroid tissue-organotypic culture system and histology of thyroid tissue maintained in its system. (a) Minced tissues embedded in type I collagen gel (cellular layer) are placed on the acellular gel (acellular layer) in inner dish (1). The inner dish (1) is put in the outer dish (2) with culture medium. In this way, the tissues in cellular layer are localized under air exposure-induced oxygenation (3-D ALI). The tissues are kept in moist and fed by culture medium that percolates by capillary action from the medium-containing outer dish, through the acellular layer and into the cellular layer. (b) Many viable thyroid follicles are maintained at 3 months in this culture system. H&E stain.
