Rice bran extract (RBE) as supplement for cell culture

Introduction In mammalian cell culture, fetal bovine serum (FBS) or proteins obtained from mammals are usually supplemented to culture media. Since the use of animal-derived components may cause an infection of virus and other pathogens, alternative supplement derived from nonmammals is eagerly required in cell culture for producing biotherapeutics and for cell therapy [1]. As an alternative supplement, we focused on rice bran extract (RBE), because several studies have been done and reported that RBE has some biological effects such as enhancement of NK cell activity and anti-inflammatory effect on mice [2] and antioxidant effect [3]. Rice bran, by-product of milling in the production of refined white rice, contains abundant nutrients and proteins. In this study, the effect of RBE was examined in the serum-free culture.