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The diploid anuran Xenopus tropicalis has emerged as a key research model in cell and developmental biology. To enhance the usefulness of this species, we developed methods for generating immortal cell lines from Nigerian strain (NXR_1018, RRID:SCR_013731) X. tropicalis embryos. We generated 14 cell lines that were propagated for several months. We selected four morphologically distinct lines, XTN-6, XTN-8, XTN-10 and XTN-12 for further characterization. Karyotype analysis revealed that three of the lines, XTN-8, XTN-10 and XTN-12 were primarily diploid. XTN-6 cultures showed a consistent mixed population of diploid cells, cells with chromosome 8 trisomy, and cells containing a tetraploid content of chromosomes. The lines were propagated using conventional culture methods as adherent cultures at 30°C in a simple, diluted L-15 medium containing fetal bovine serum without use of a high CO 2 incubator. Transcriptome analysis indicated that the four lines were distinct lineages. These methods will be useful in the generation of cell lines from normal and mutant strains of X. tropicalis as well as other species of Xenopus . 

Abstract Summary Sequencing data resources have increased exponentially in recent years, as has interest in large-scale meta-analyses of integrated next-generation sequencing datasets. However, curation of integrated datasets that match a user’s particular research priorities is currently a time-intensive and imprecise task. MetaSeek is a sequencing data discovery tool that enables users to flexibly search and filter on any metadata field to quickly find the sequencing datasets that meet their needs. MetaSeek automatically scrapes metadata from all publicly available datasets in the Sequence Read Archive, cleans and parses messy, user-provided metadata into a structured, standard-compliant database and predicts missing fields where possible. MetaSeek provides a web-based graphical user interface and interactive visualization dashboard, as well as a programmatic API to rapidly search, filter, visualize, save, share and download matching sequencing metadata. Availability and implementation The MetaSeek online interface is available at https://www.metaseek.cloud/. The MetaSeek database can also be accessed via API to programmatically search, filter and download all metadata. MetaSeek source code, metadata scrapers and documents are available at https://github.com/MetaSeek-Sequencing-Data-Discovery/metaseek/.