Culturing of Melanocytes from the Equine Hair Follicle Outer Root Sheath

Hair follicles harbor a heterogeneous regenerative cell pool and represent putative low-to-non-invasively available source of stem cells. We previously reported technology for culturing human melanocytes from the hair follicle outer root sheath (ORS) autologous pigmentation tissue engineered skin equivalents. This study translated ORS to horses. de-veloped culture equine (eMORS) forelock cultured by means an analogue follicle-based in vitro methodology. The procedure was adjusted physiology addition serum medium. were isolated macerating rests, enzymatically digested subjected air-medium-interface cultivation method. resulted differentiated melanocytes, which exhibited typical morphology, presence melanosomes, expression cytoskeleton proteins vimentin, α-SMA, Sox2, S100ß tyrosinase as well activity followed production melanin. According all assessed parameters, eMORS could be ranked partially melanotic melanocytes. results offer experimental base further insight into biology comparative studies across different species.