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Health & Medicine
Pradeep Kumar

07/02/21 14:00 PM IST

Silk-protein-based tumour models

In news

Improving on techniques for testing cancer drugs, researchers from IIT Guwahati have come up with silk-protein–based tumour models.

Model
  • An alternative to testing cancer drugs using patient-derived cell lines or animal models, the research involves fabrication of a bio-active composite of silk proteins from two species of silk moths and building a scaffolding that provides a three-dimensional base for growing tumouroids.
  • Cancer drugs are tested using patient-derived primary cancer cells, on tumours induced in animal models or on genetically modified organisms.
  • These models are insufficient to reproduce the three-dimensional morphology and physiology of human tumours and hence show inaccuracies in drug screening.
  • This tissue-engineered 3D silk-based tumour model imitates native tumour microenvironment, complex tumour physiology and metastasis, thus improving drug screening efficacy.
How the model was made?
  • The scientists mixed the silk fibroins extracted from the cocoons of the domestic silk moth (Bombyx mori) and the silk glands of the muga silk moth (Antheraea assama) in equal proportions and used them to build up scaffolds on which they grew breast and liver tumour cell cultures.
  • The Bombyx mori silk fibroin has been well explored for healthcare applications and is also FDA approved.
  • The researchers created breast and liver tumouroids and these showed similar tumour physiology in 3D spatiotemporal arrangements and drug-resistance, as in native solid tumours.
  • The cancer model in the current study demonstrated a better response than monolayer [2D] and spheroid models.
Way forward
  • The group next plans to miniaturise the cancer model using microfluidics technology and to mimic the native tumour by adding blood vessels in it.
  • “This improved model would assist in studying cancer metastasis from one tissue to another tissue and drug testing for cancer metastasis.
Source: The Hindu

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