The impact of a novel 3D cell culture model of glioblastoma on radiation and drug-radiation responses

Gomez-Roman, N. and Chalmers, A. (2016) The impact of a novel 3D cell culture model of glioblastoma on radiation and drug-radiation responses. Radiotherapy and Oncology, 119 (S1). S280-S281. (https://doi.org/10.1016/S0167-8140(16)31835-7)

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Abstract

Novel 3D cell culture models enable cell growth in a more physiological environment than conventional 2D cell cultures. Most importantly, cells need to be embedded in a composition of extracellular matrix proteins similarly present in situ to guarantee conservation of the phenotype. As shown by comparative analyses between 2D, 3D and tumor xenografts, various processes such as signal transduction and DNA repair share great similarity in 3D and in-vivo but not 2D. Based on our long-standing experience, a large variety of endpoints can be determined and many methods can be conducted in 3D matrix-based cell cultures. While this is sometimes not as easy as in 2D and also requires a bit more financial invest, the generated data reflect cell behavior invivo and thus have a higher clinically relevance. Further, we are able to address specific tumor features in detail. For example, malignant tumors show great genetic/epigenetic and morphological/cell biological heterogeneity. Here, a prime example is the stiffness of a tumor. Although we know that the stiffness greatly varies in different parts of the tumor, the underlying mechanisms and prosurvival consequences on the genetic/epigenetic and morphological/cell biological level are far from being understood. 3D matrix-based cell cultures models can elegantly support our efforts to gain more knowledge in this field. Another important point is the sparing of animal experiments based on our broad knowledge that human (patho)physiology is significantly different from mice (or other species). Many decades of in-vivo research have demonstrated that only a negligible proportion of therapeutic approaches could be translated from rodents to humans. In conclusion, 3D cell cultures are powerful tools to generate more clinically relevant information. A broader implementation of this methodology is likely to underscore our efforts to better understand tumor and normal cell radiation responses and foster identification of most critical cancer targets

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