Depletion of mouse cells for isolation of human cells

1. A process for depleting host cells from a xenograft of human cells on a murine host, comprising:

a) fragmenting the xenograft into a sample comprising a single cell suspension

b) subjecting the sample to antibodies specific for a murine CD9 epitope coupled to a detection means

c) depleting the cell suspension from cells bound by the CD9 antibodies using the detection means

d) collecting the cells not bound by the CD9-antibodies;

e) subjecting the collected cells not bound by CD9 antibodies obtained in d) to antibodies specific for one or more murine epitopes selected from the group consisting of CD45, CD51, CD31, Ter119, CD24, EpCAM, Sca1, CD11b, CD95, H2Kk, H2Kd, and CD171, each coupled to a detection means, and

f) depleting the murine cells coupled to these antibodies to obtain human cells.

2. The process according to claim 1 , wherein the detection means of the antibodies is selected from the group consisting of magnetic particles, fluorescent dyes, and a solid support.

3. The process according to claim 1 , wherein the depletion of step c) is performed as at least one of magnetic separation, panning, and fluorescence activated cell sorting (FACS).

4. The process according to claim 1 , wherein mice are used as host.

5. The process according to claim 1 , wherein the human cells are human tumor cells.

6. The process according to claim 5 further comprising step g), the human cells obtained in step f) are subjected to antibodies specific for a human marker coupled to a detection means and further separated using the detection means into at least two fractions comprising distinct cell subpopulations.