Cultivated human arterial smooth muscle cells. The effect of donor age, blood pressure, diabetes and smoking on in vitro cell growth.

The growth capacity and morphology of cultured human smooth muscle cells obtained from omental arteries from 153 patients were studied. The cells exhibited a very slow growth rate compared to rat or minipig SMC's, but they too developed cultures in a typical hill-and-valley pattern and possessed bundles of myofilaments. Two groups of smooth muscle cell cultures, slowly proliferating ones and rapidly proliferating ones were compared in their relation to donor age, blood pressure, nicotine abuse, diabetes mellitus and carcinoma. In the case of blood pressure and carcinoma significant differences indicated that those smooth muscle cells obtained from patients with high blood pressure or carcinoma revealed lower growth capacities. In the second subculture the proliferation of smooth muscle cells was found to be inversely proportional to donor age (4 to 78 years).