Attempts have been made to culture the mucosa from various parts of the gastrointestinal tract. In this study, using an explant culture method, epithelial cells have been successfully cultured from all major regions of the gastrointestinal tract. The success rate, as judged by outgrowth of epithelial cells for at least 4 weeks, varied with the tissue studied with 19/50 colonic biopsies, 5/11 small intestinal biopsies, 9/12 stomach biopsies and 42/47 gallbladder biopsies yielding outgrowth of epithelial cells. Differentiation of the epithelial cells along the mucus cell pathway could be demonstrated on the monolayer cultures using Periodic acid Schiff or Alcian blue staining. Because the cultures were very heterogeneous and many morphological cell types were present in most cultures, differentiation along the other known differentiation pathways of the gastrointestinal mucosa, such as development of absorptive cells and endocrine cells, could not be excluded.The problem of bacterial contamination, which has hindered previous studies on tissue from these sites, was overcome by decontaminating the biopsy by soaking in dilute sodium hypochlorite (0.04%).