Grace A. Snyder

TL;DR: In this article , the effect of increased temperature on phagocytic activity, as an indication of immune function, was examined and it was shown that immune cell activity increases during heat stress, while small molecule pinocytosis remains unaffected.

TL;DR: In the current study, fluorescence-activated cell sorting (FACS) is used to isolate and separate different cell populations in stony corals to investigate coral response to stressors and enable researchers to work on corals at the cellular level for analysis, functional assays, and gene expression studies of differentcell populations.

Abstract: Summary Stem cells are the foundation for cell therapy due to their ability to self-renew, differentiate into other cell types, and persist throughout the life of an organism. Stem cell isolation and transplantation have not yet been established in Hexacorallia, a cnidarian subclass containing stony corals and sea anemones. Here, we demonstrate that candidate stem cells in the hexacorallian Nematostella vectensis can be transplanted into adult animals. These cells exhibited the hallmarks of stem cell functional properties; they integrated into recipients’ tissues and rescued them from lethal doses of chemotherapy. Additionally, these cells proliferated and survived serial transplantations. Notably, we showed that this cellular subpopulation can be enriched by sorting using species-non-specific cell markers and that similar subpopulations of cells can be isolated from other hexacorallians, including stony corals. This research establishes the basis for studying stem cell biology on a functional level in Hexacorallia.

TL;DR: This work presents standardized methodologies for flow cytometry-mediated identification and analyses of cells from the model ctenophore Mnemiopsis leidyi that can also be applied to isolate targeted cell populations, and focuses on the identification and isolation of ctenophile phagocytes.