TY - JOUR
T1 - Out of the Laboratory and Into the Field
T2 - Validation of Portable Cell Culture Protocols
AU - McDade, Thomas W.
AU - Aronoff, Jacob E.
AU - Leigh, Adam K.K.
AU - Finegood, Eric D.
AU - Weissman-Tsukamoto, Rachel M.
AU - Brody, Gene H.
AU - Miller, Gregory E.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
Copyright © 2021 by the American Psychosomatic Society.
PY - 2021/4/1
Y1 - 2021/4/1
N2 - OBJECTIVE: Field-based research on inflammation and health is typically limited to baseline measures of circulating cytokines or acute-phase proteins, whereas laboratory-based studies can pursue a more dynamic approach with ex vivo cell culture methods. The laboratory infrastructure required for culturing leukocytes limits application in community-based settings, which in turn limits scientific understandings of how psychosocial, behavioral, and contextual factors influence the regulation of inflammation. We aim to address this gap by validating two "field-friendly" cell culture protocols, one using a small volume of venous whole blood and another using finger-stick capillary whole blood. METHODS: We evaluated the performance of both protocols against a standard laboratory-based protocol using matched venous and capillary blood samples collected from young adults (n = 24). Samples were incubated with lipopolysaccharide and hydrocortisone, and the production of proinflammatory cytokines interleukin 1β, interleukin 6, and tumor necrosis factor α was measured in response. RESULTS: Comparisons indicate a high level of agreement in responses across the protocols and culture conditions. The overall correlation in results was 0.88 between the standard and small-volume protocols and 0.86 between the standard and capillary blood protocols. Repeatability for the small-volume and capillary blood protocols was high, with mean coefficients of variation across five replicates of 6.2% and 5.4%, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: These results demonstrate the feasibility of culturing cells and quantifying the inflammatory response to challenge outside the laboratory, with a wide range of potential applications in biobehavioral research in community-based and remote field settings.
AB - OBJECTIVE: Field-based research on inflammation and health is typically limited to baseline measures of circulating cytokines or acute-phase proteins, whereas laboratory-based studies can pursue a more dynamic approach with ex vivo cell culture methods. The laboratory infrastructure required for culturing leukocytes limits application in community-based settings, which in turn limits scientific understandings of how psychosocial, behavioral, and contextual factors influence the regulation of inflammation. We aim to address this gap by validating two "field-friendly" cell culture protocols, one using a small volume of venous whole blood and another using finger-stick capillary whole blood. METHODS: We evaluated the performance of both protocols against a standard laboratory-based protocol using matched venous and capillary blood samples collected from young adults (n = 24). Samples were incubated with lipopolysaccharide and hydrocortisone, and the production of proinflammatory cytokines interleukin 1β, interleukin 6, and tumor necrosis factor α was measured in response. RESULTS: Comparisons indicate a high level of agreement in responses across the protocols and culture conditions. The overall correlation in results was 0.88 between the standard and small-volume protocols and 0.86 between the standard and capillary blood protocols. Repeatability for the small-volume and capillary blood protocols was high, with mean coefficients of variation across five replicates of 6.2% and 5.4%, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: These results demonstrate the feasibility of culturing cells and quantifying the inflammatory response to challenge outside the laboratory, with a wide range of potential applications in biobehavioral research in community-based and remote field settings.
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U2 - 10.1097/PSY.0000000000000923
DO - 10.1097/PSY.0000000000000923
M3 - Article
C2 - 33657081
AN - SCOPUS:85103805012
VL - 83
SP - 283
EP - 290
JO - Psychosomatic Medicine
JF - Psychosomatic Medicine
SN - 0033-3174
IS - 3
ER -