Multicellular tumour spheroids grown in vitro have been widely used in cancer research as an experimental preparation with many of the characteristics of tumours. They provide a model system for understanding the optical behaviour of tumour tissue, which is of interest in novel diagnostic and therapeutic procedures. Optical measurements on fresh spheroids in the wavelength range of 600-1000 nm ...

Many chemotherapeutic strategies have failed due to pronounced diffusion limitations in tumors induced by poor vasculaturization. Diffusion limitations, present in threedimensional tissue, produce nutrient deficient regions that eventually become necrotic in tumors in vivo. Multicellular spheroids are better models of in vivo tumors than monolayer cultures because they mimic the heterogeneous m...

Multicellular spheroids of cancer cells have been increasingly used to screen anti-tumor compounds, owing to their in vivo like microenvironment and structure as well as compatibility to high-throughput/high-content screening. Here we report the potency and efficacy of a family of bufadienolides to inhibit the growth of gastric cancer cell line HGC-27 in three-dimensional (3D) spheroidal models...

Monolayer cultures of the human breast cancer cell line MDA-361 require insulin for growth and for maintenance of viability, as is evidenced by rapid and complete degeneration of the cells after the removal of insulin from the medium. Detachment from the plastic surface occurs within 24 to 48 hr, and the rare (less than 0.1%) cell that remains attached doubles every 3 to 4 weeks. Multicellular ...

The present study investigated differences in the growth rate of multicellular tumour spheroids of the MCF-7 line of human breast cancer before and after their irradiation. Growth of the spheroids was analysed according to a model based on a Gompertz function. In this model, normalization to a common initial volume is achieved in a way that enables meaningful comparisons to be made between the ...

An attractive option for tissue engineering is to use of multicellular spheroids as microtissues, particularly with stem cell spheroids. Conventional approaches of fabricating spheroids suffer from low throughput and polydispersity in size, and fail to supplement cues from extracellular matrix (ECM) for enhanced differentiation. In this study, we report the application of microfluidics-generate...

The Ras proto-oncogene has been implicated in the in vivo development of tumors and in the in vitro transformation of cultured cell lines. In both of these conditions, Ras-mediated disruption of cell cycle-regulatory mechanisms leads to unregulated cellular proliferation, although the exact mechanisms by which Ras accomplishes this are not clear. Using as a model the M1 and MR1 rat fibroblast c...

In order to understand the role of glucose limitations in controlling multicellular tumor spheroid growth, knowledge of the glucose diffusion coefficient is essential. The effective diffusivity of glucose in spheroids of rodent and human tumor cell lines has been determined by measuring the efflux of tritium labeled L-glucose from spheroids with time. When the rapid and irreversible binding of ...