An Inexpensive Incubator for Mammalian Cell Culture Capable of Regulating O2, CO2, and Temperature

Abstract

Mammalian cell culture is widely used for discovery and development. Recently, increasing attention has been paid to the importance of maintaining physiologically-relevant conditions in cell culture. Although oxygen level is a particularly important consideration, it is rarely regulated by experimentalists. The atmospheric O2 levels commonly used in cell culture are significantly higher than those experienced by most mammalian cells in vivo, leaving cells susceptible to oxidative damage, senescence, transformation, and otherwise aberrant physiology. A barrier to incorporating O2 regulation into most cell culture workflows has been the expense of investing in new equipment, as the vast majority of laboratory CO2 incubators do not regulate O2. Here, we describe an inexpensive (