Using Immune Cell/Adipocyte Co-Culture Models to Identify Inflammatory Paracrine Signaling Mechanisms: A Process Attenuated by Long-Chain N-3 Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids

Abstract

This invited Commentary is on the methods paper entitled “Studying adipocyte and immune cell cross talk using a co-culture system” in Immunometabolism: Methods and Protocols [1]. Co-culturing individual immune cell populations (as primary cells or cell lines) with adipocytes represents a model system to study the paracrine interactions (or cross-talk) between cell types that can impact adipose tissue (AT) function. This is particularly relevant in obese AT, wherein paracrine interactions between cell types promotes the secretion of inflammatory mediators that contribute to increased local (i.e. within the AT) and systemic low-grade inflammation and metabolic dysfunction, including insulin resistance (IR) [2-5].