Gene expression analysis of 3D spheroid culture of human embryonic kidney cells

Abstract

RGD (arginine-glycine-aspartic) containing elastin-like proteins (RGD-ELP), in the structure of TGPG[VGRGD (VGVPG)6]20WPC, was treated to HEK293 cells to construct in vivo-mimic 3-dimensional (3D) spheroid cells. The constructed 3D cells had increased extracellular matrices (ECMs). To identify the induced functions of 3D cells with ECMs, genomic profiles changed in 3D cells compared to the conventional 2-dimensional (2D) cells were analyzed. In HEK293 cells exposed RGD-ELP for 72 h, the total up- and down-regulated genes (824 genes) were selected to be differentially expressed genes. Further analysis by bioinformatics showed that top functions induced in 3D cells were cell proliferation, cell-to-cell signaling, cell differentiation and movement, and connective tissue development and function. We propose that the 3D cells constructed with RGD-ELP in this study could provide more in vivo-mimic responses by cell-to-cell and cell-to-ECM signaling. © 2013 Korean Society of Environmental Risk Assessment and Health Science and Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht.