Adoptive transfer of allogeneic natural killer (NK) cells is an attractive therapy approach against ovarian carcinoma. Here, we evaluated the potency of highly active NK cells derived from human CD34+ haematopoietic stem and progenitor cells (HSPC) to infiltrate and mediate killing of human ovarian cancer spheroids using an in vivo-like model system and mouse xenograft model. These CD56+Perfori...

The increasing number of publications on the subject shows that nanomedicine is an attractive field for investigations aiming to considerably improve anticancer chemotherapy. Based on selective tumor targeting while sparing healthy tissue, carrier-mediated drug delivery has been expected to provide significant benefits to patients. However, despite reduced systemic toxicity, most nanodrugs appr...

Multicellular tumour spheroids are cellular aggregates that can be prepared from many types of tumour cells. These three-dimensional structures provide a model for analysing the effects of cell-cell contact and intercellular microenvironments on phenomena such as autocrine regulation of growth factor synthesis. Autoregulation of the synthesis of transforming growth factor-a (TGF-a) was investig...

Monolayer cell culture does not adequately model the in vivo behavior of tissues, which involves complex cell-cell and cell-matrix interactions. Three-dimensional (3D) cell culture techniques are a recent innovation developed to address the shortcomings of adherent cell culture. While several techniques for generating tissue analogues in vitro have been developed, these methods are frequently c...

Oligonucleotides have shown promise in selectively manipulating gene expression in vitro, but that success has not translated to the clinic for cancer therapy. A potential reason for this is that cells behave differently in monolayer than in the three-dimensional tumor, resulting in limited penetration and distribution of oligonucleotides in the tumor. This may be especially true when oligonucl...

Tumor microenvironments present significant barriers to anti-tumor agents. Molecules involved in multicellular tumor microenvironments, however, are difficult to study ex vivo. Here, we generated a matrix-free tumor spheroid model using the NCI-H226 mesothelioma cell line and compared the gene expression profiles of spheroids and monolayers using microarray analysis. Microarray analysis reveale...

Tumor-associated fibroblasts (TAF) and tumor-associated macrophages are the main stromal components in desmoplastic breast tumors. These host cell types were extensively studied individually with regard to tumor development and progression but little is known about their reciprocal interactions. To elucidate the role of TAF in the recruitment of monocytes (MO) we designed a 3D co-culture system...

BACKGROUND Epithelial ovarian carcinoma is a deadly disease characterized by overt peritoneal metastasis. Individual cells and multicellular aggregates, or spheroids, seed these metastases, both commonly found in ascites. Mechanisms that foster spheroid attachment to the peritoneal tissues preceding formation of secondary lesions are largely unknown. METHODS Cell culture models of SKOV-3, OVC...

Three-dimensional (3D) cell culture is beneficial for physiological studies of tumor cells, due to its potential to deliver a high quantity of cell culture information that is representative of the cancer microenvironment and predictive of drug responses in vivo. Currently, gel-associated or matrix-associated 3D cell culture is comprised of intricate procedures that often result in experimental...

To invade and metastasize to distant loci, breast cancer cells must breach the layer of basement membrane surrounding the tumor and then invade through the dense collagen I-rich extracellular environment of breast tissue. Previous studies have shown that breast cancer cell aggregate morphology in basement membrane extract correlated with cell invasive capacity in some contexts. Moreover, cell l...