Normal and psoriatic keratinocytes and fibroblasts compared in culture.

The ability of psoriatic fibroblasts to stimulate growth of epidermal cells was studied by comparing the capacity of murine 3T3 cells, normal fibroblasts and psoriatic fibroblasts to act as feeder layers for cultured normal human keratinocytes. 3T3 cells consistently gave shorter times to confluency than normal or psoriatic cells which were about the same. The SDS polyacrylamide gel electrophoretic pattern of the fibrous protein was identical irrespective of the feeder layer use. Psoriatic epidermal cells could be grown from single cell suspensions by using 10(-9) M cholera toxin in the medium. The cultured psoriatic keratinocytes grew identically to normal cells and made the same fibrous protein. The psoriatic keratinocytes also grew better on 3T3 cells than normal or psoriatic fibroblasts.