First Continuous Cell Lines End Six-Decade Quest to Culture Marine

A review in Aquaculture Science and Management says the field of marine invertebrate cell culture has finally achieved its long-sought milestone: in 2025, researchers established the first continuously proliferating marine invertebrate cell lines. Derived from embryonic stages of sea urchins Lytechinus variegatus and Strongylocentrotus purpuratus, the lines were grown in an artificial seawater-based Urchin Medium with 3–15% fetal bovine serum. Over three years they reportedly reached more than 100 to 200 population doublings without exogenous immortalization, remained genetically tractable with lentiviral transduction and tolerated CRISPR editing. The paper notes remaining questions around industrial scalability, long-term genetic stability, and expression efficiency for marine natural products.