noun, plural: tissue cultures
(2) The biological culture such cells
Biological cultures are a common laboratory means in order to study living organisms. There are different types of biological cultures, such as cell culture, tissue culture, and organ culture. Cell culture is a biological culture of cells of multicellular eukaryotes. Tissue culture is the cultivation of tissues from multicellular organisms. Organ culture is the cultivation of a part or all of an animal organ in a sterile controlled medium.
Cell culture is the cultivation of cells derived from a multicellular eukaryote and grown under controlled conditions, outside of their natural environment. The cells grown are typically animal cells since the cultivation of fungal cells are termed fungal culture whereas the cultivation of plant cells are particularly referred to as plant tissue culture.
Cell cultures, such as those of live cell lines, are essential in studying and producing large-scale biological products which would otherwise be ethically unsound when done directly on animals. It has become a means of manufacturing therapeutic products, such as vaccines, immunobiologicals, synthetic hormones, anticancer agents, etc..