(Press-News.org) VIDEO:
This video shows tissue engineering of a human 3D in vitro tumor test system.
Click here for more information.
On August 6th, JoVE, the Journal of Visualized Experiments, will publish two new methods for scientists to study and treat tumor growth. The methods introduce a lab-born, human tissue structure with replicated human biochemistry – offering scientists the opportunity to grow, observe, and ultimately learn how to treat biopsied human tumor cells.
The University Hospital of Würzburg scientists behind the experiment have created a new version of the testing structures known as biological vascularized scaffolds (BioVaSc). Their three-dimensional human-tissue structures are the first of their kind to be built with multiple human cell types. The structures offer two methods for study: a three-dimensional (3D) static system for short term testing that is beneficial for microscopy imaging, and a dynamic system that introduces a flow-simulation to simulate actual conditions of the human body. This is especially helpful in long term studies of metastasis, or, the spreading of cancer cells through the human vascular system.
"Our 3D tumor model is reducing or even replacing animal experiments," said engineer Jenny Reboredo. In their article, Reboredo and her colleagues explained that this human-tissue based testing system could eliminate the potential for the misinterpretation that often accompanies animal testing. Furthermore, this method solves the shortfalls of typical in-vitro testing, which is limited by the lack of intercellular interactions.
The authors also suggest that their use of primary cells derived from tumor biopsies is a "very important step towards personalized medicine." With the method the team has created, a lab could in the future take a biopsy of a cancer cell and do tests to find the most effective treatment before ever administering drugs to the human patient.
Further implications of Reboredo and her colleagues' work involve the use of a BioVaSc-type method for studying non-tumorous diseases. "In the long term we want to be able to develop disease models, especially for diseases where no animal models are available," Reboredo said.
When asked why she and her colleagues published in JoVE, Reboredo noted that their models "can be explained and visualized best in a movie [and] to publish in such a media is made possible by JoVE."
###
About JoVE, the Journal of Visualized Experiments:
JoVE, the Journal of Visualized Experiments, is the first and only PubMed/MEDLINE-indexed, peer-reviewed journal devoted to publishing scientific research in a video format. Using an international network of videographers, JoVE films and edits videos of researchers performing new experimental techniques at top universities, allowing students and scientists to learn them much more quickly. JoVE has published video-protocols from an international community of nearly 8,000 authors in the fields of biology, medicine, chemistry, and physics.
Cancer research implies future for personalized medicine, reduction in animal testing
2013-08-06
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
Family matters: Evolutionary relationships among species of 'magic' mushrooms shed light on fungi
2013-08-06
"Magic" mushrooms are well known for their hallucinogenic properties. Until now, less has been known about their evolutionary development and how they should be classified in the fungal Tree of Life. New research helps uncover the evolutionary past of a fascinating fungi that has wide recreational use and is currently under investigation for a variety of medicinal applications.
In the 19th century, the discovery of hallucinogenic mushrooms prompted research into the mushrooms' taxonomy, biochemistry, and historical usage. Gastón Guzmán, a world authority on the genus ...
New UNH research: Online predators not distinctively dangerous sex offenders
2013-08-06
DURHAM, N.H. – A new University of New Hampshire study challenges the view that online predators are a distinctly dangerous variety of sex offender, requiring special programs to protect youth.
The study from the UNH Crimes against Children Research Center finds that sex offenders who target teens increasingly use Internet and cell phone communications to lure teens into sexual relationships. In crimes that involve such communications, offenders who meet and recruit youth online operate in much the same way as offenders who meet and know youth in ordinary offline environments.
"These ...
Why tumors become drug-resistant
2013-08-06
CAMBRIDGE, Mass-- Cancer drugs known as ErbB inhibitors have shown great success in treating many patients with lung, breast, colon and other types of cancer. However, ErbB drug resistance means that many other patients do not respond, and even among those who do, tumors commonly come back.
A new study from MIT reveals that much of this resistance develops because a protein called AXL helps cancer cells to circumvent the effects of ErbB inhibitors, allowing them to grow unchecked. The findings suggest that combining drugs that target AXL and ErbB receptors could offer ...
Large Area Picosecond Photodetectors push timing envelope
2013-08-06
WASHINGTON D.C. August 6, 2013 -- The Large Area Picosecond Photodetector (LAPPD) collaboration has developed big detectors that push the timing envelope, measuring the speed of particles with a precision down to trillionths of a second.
As described in the journal Review of Scientific Instruments, which is produced by the AIP Publishing, a team of researchers within the LAPPD collaboration developed an advanced facility for testing large area photodetectors -- with a level of spatial precision measured in micrometers and time resolutions at or below a picosecond.
"Innovation ...
Illinois scientists put cancer-fighting power back into frozen broccoli
2013-08-06
URBANA, Ill. – There was bad news, then good news from University of Illinois broccoli researchers this month. In the first study, they learned that frozen broccoli lacks the ability to form sulforaphane, the cancer-fighting phytochemical in fresh broccoli. But a second study demonstrated how the food industry can act to restore the frozen vegetable's health benefits.
"We discovered a technique that companies can use to make frozen broccoli as nutritious as fresh. That matters because many people choose frozen veggies for their convenience and because they're less expensive," ...
Let's have lunch! -- teachers eating with their students provides nutrition education opportunities
2013-08-06
Philadelphia, PA, August 6, 2013 – Much attention has focused on school meals, both in the United States and across the globe. Researchers at Uppsala University, Sweden, evaluated teachers eating lunch with the school children. In Sweden, this practice is referred to as "pedagogic meals" because it offers the opportunity of having children learn by modeling adults. The researchers wanted to observe how the teachers interacted with the children during meals in order to better understand how to interpret results of this practice. The study is published in the September/October ...
Localized wind power blowing more near homes, farms & factories
2013-08-06
RICHLAND, Wash. -- Americans are increasingly installing wind turbines near their homes, farms and businesses to generate their own energy, concludes a new report released today.
The 2012 Market Report on Wind Technologies in Distributed Applications is the first comprehensive analysis on a growing field called distributed wind, which involves generating wind energy close to where it will be used instead of purchasing power from large, centralized wind farms. Distributed wind can range from a small, solitary turbine in someone's backyard to several large turbines that ...
Liver transplant patients have high rates of metabolic syndrome
2013-08-06
MAYWOOD, Il. – Nearly 59 percent of liver transplant patients experience metabolic syndrome, which increases the risk of heart disease, stroke and diabetes, according to a study lead by liver specialist Eric R. Kallwitz, MD, of Loyola University Medical Center.
But despite this high risk, exercise might be a key in preventing metabolic syndrome – and the intensity of exercise might be more important than the duration.
The study is published in Liver Transplantation, a journal of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases and the International Liver Transplantation ...
Exercise may reduce heart disease risk in liver transplant recipients
2013-08-06
New research reveals that metabolic syndrome—risk factors that can lead to heart disease and/or stroke—is common in liver transplant recipients, with rates highest at one year following the procedure. Findings published in Liver Transplantation, a journal of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases and the International Liver Transplantation Society, indicate that exercise could reduce complications from metabolic disease in patients post-transplantation.
The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute suggests that obesity, physical inactivity, and insulin ...
Altering organic molecules' interaction with light
2013-08-06
Enhancing and manipulating the light emission of organic molecules is at heart of many important technological and scientific advances, including in the fields of organic light emitting devices, bio-imaging, bio-molecular detection. Researchers at MIT have now discovered a new platform that enables dramatic manipulation of the emission of organic molecules when simply suspended on top of a carefully designed planar slab with a periodic array of holes: so-called photonic crystal surface.
Influenced by the fast and directional emission channels (called 'resonances') provided ...