ABSTRACT- (9) reported that the growth of DDT,MF-2 smooth muscle cells was suppressed by thapsigargine, an intracel lular Ca 21 pump inhibitor, which also suppressed spon taneous calcium oscillations in our cultured smooth mus cle cells (7). These reports prompted us to investigate the relationship between the spontaneous Ca2+ oscillations and cell proliferation in the culture cells. Here, we ex amined the effects of BAPTA, caffeine, thapsigargine and La3+, which all suppress Ca2+ oscillations, on cell proliferation. The longitudinal muscle segments of small intestine were obtained from male guinea pig as described previous ly (7) and then cut into small pieces. Small explants of lon gitudinal muscle were cultured in minimum essential me dium (MEM; Gibco, Gaithersburg, MD, USA) containing 20% fetal calf serum on 25-mm-diameter glass coverslips inside 35-mm Petri dishes and maintained at 37 °C under humidified conditions of 95 % air 5 % CO2. After 24 hr, the culture medium was replaced with MEM containing 10% fetal calf serum, and the medium was changed after 4 days in culture. Cells began to grow out from the ex plants after 4 days in culture. Cells cultured for 6 to 7 days were used in the experiments. [Ca 21]i was measured by using a digital video imaging system and fura-2 in MEM containing 12.5 mM HEPES, pH 7.4, as described previously (7). The imaging system consisted of a Nikon Diaphoto TMD fluorescence microscope (Tokyo); CAM 230 (Japan Spectroscopic Co., Tokyo), a dual wavelength fluorescence excitator; an intensified CCD camera, C2400-87; and an image analyzer, ARGUS-50
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.