Using a patented laboratory device, Chinese scientists have for
the first time grown cancer tumors outside the body which they say
will lead to a new generation of cancer treatments.
Liu Hua, visiting professor with Zhongshan Hospital in
Shanghai,says scientists have for years been able to grow cancer
cells in lab but have never been able to reproduce a living cancer
tumor.
Liu called the breakthrough a milestone in cancer research that
will lead to the development of a new generation of cancer
treatments using biological medicines that have virtually no side
effects. Someday it may help scientists develop actual cancer
vaccines.
Liu has been asked to deliver a paper to the American
Association of Cancer Researchers in Los Angles in mid-April.
"I expect the paper will generate a lot of positive and
interesting reaction," said Liu.
The doctor of internal medicine says he has shown tumor he has
grown to scientists in Beijing and Shanghai.
"They are very excited about it. Some have worked 30 or 40 years
and have never seen a tumor outside the body. They agree it's a
milestone in cancer research."
Liu says drug companies and researchers often find the
treatments they develop using a simple culture of cancer cells,
don't work well on the tumor itself, which are awkward to test on
patients or lab animals that have been cancer induced.
Now they will be able to work with a complete, three dimensional
tumor and examine how it reacts, metastasize or grows when treated
in different ways.
"Compared with conventional breeding systems we can continuously
observe the behavior of a tumor. It is difficult to observe
metastasis in a patient," Liu said.
Liu says working with an actual cancer tumor will make it
possible to design patient-specific treatment regimens that are far
less toxic than conventional treatments such a chemotherapy.
(Xinhua News Agency March 31, 2007)