TC Treated Plastic - (Mar/26/2007 )

Can you grow suspension cells in TC-treated flasks/plates. If not, what does the TC treatment do to the cells? Grenier uses a "physical" modification to make their TC-treated plates rather than chemical modification. Would that be OK for suspension cells?

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Yes. Many labs use these flasks/plates to grow suspension cells...to make life easier...less confusion.
TC-treated flask/plates containing a lysine coating for cells to attach, as cells do not attach to plastic


I don't know anything about "physical" modification...unless it means making the plastic plates into glass plates.

Hope this may help.

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TC Plastic is again one of the most important things to know about and understand. It can have a major influence on cell adherence and growth and can therefore ultimately influence your experimental results.
Normal TC plastic has a net negative charge. TC treatment cross links carboxyl and amine groups and gives the plastic its net negative charge.
TC surface modification is usually done by ionizing radiation or other physio-chemical methods ( F. Grinnell 1978 Int. Rev.Cytol 43. p.65 ).
Poly L/D Lysine are products that are used to for some cells that do not adhere to negatively charged TC plastic. Lysine coats the plastic and gives it a net positive charge.
Other products are also available to increase and facilitate cell adhesion i.e. Laminin, collagen (Type I-IV), ECM, Fibronectin etc.

When growing any cells, one of the first things I tell my students is to OPTIMISE all culture conditions. Generally people know about Media, FCS/FBS, CO2 concentration, split ratios etc, but very few ever think about TC Plastic....corning, costar, nunc, greiner, falcon, tpp etc will all support cell growth, but optimising your conditions can save time and money in the long run.

Hope this clears up some issues.

Rhombus

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Thank you Rhombus for the very useful information.

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wow, I feel dumb....I always thought 'TC treated plastic' meant 'tissue-culture treated plastic'....I thought it was always to be preferred for any cell culture application

learn something new every day

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