New York, Dec 29 (IANS) In a development that could
lead to personalised treatment for people suffering from cancer, two
Indian-origin researchers have developed a way to grow cancer cells in
the laboratory that mimics the environment inside the body.
The
new capture and culture method provides a reliable way to get usable
numbers of circulating tumour cells from even early-stage patients, the
researchers said.
“It is a major game changer. This culture
method gives clinicians a way to study each patient's cancer much
earlier and much more frequently,” said Sunitha Nagrath, assistant
professor of chemical engineering at University of Michigan.
We
can look for resistance to therapy and test potential therapeutics. It
also moves us closer to being able to predict metastasis (spread of
cancer), she said.
The capture and culture process starts with a
microfluidic chip device that captures cancer cells as a blood sample is
pumped across it.
Nagrath, along with Nithya Ramnath, associate professor of medical oncology, used a chip on a glass slide.
They
covered the chip with microscopic posts that slow and trap cells, then
coated it with antibodies that bind to the cancer cells.
After
the cancer cells were captured on the chip, the team pumped in a mixture
of collagen and Matrigel (a complex protein mixture) growth medium.
They also added cancer-associated fibroblast cells that were grown in
university laboratory.
This created a three-dimensional
environment that closely mimics the conditions inside the body of a
cancer patient, the study noted.
"Primary cancer cells do not
grow well on a flat surface, and like people, they need neighbours to
really prosper," Nagrath said.
"The collagen and Matrigel provide
a three-dimensional environment for the cells to grow, while the
cancer-associated fibroblasts give them the neighbouring cells they
need," she added.
The study appeared online in the journal Oncotarget.