what is the difference between"clonal population" and "pools" - (Aug/13/2006 )

what is the difference between "clonal population" and "pools" ,when it comes to cultured cells.Thank you for your explaination!

Let's take the example of lymphocytes.
You know that we have million of lymphocytes, and each of them has an unique T cell receptor.
if you take one cell, that you expand, you will get million of cells, identical, with the same receptor. It's a clonal population.

if you start your culture with several cells out of the patient, these cells are not identical, they will make new cells identical to the cells out of the patients, but they will not be all identical each other. the population is mixed. It's a pool of cells.

Usually you start to culture a pool, and then you clone them, you dilute the cells so you have one cell per well (and you add feeder cells, it's killed cells that will help your lymphocyte cell to grow). And when this cells grow you get a clonal population.