Cervical cancer: Researchers develop 3 dimensional model for large scale screenings of drugs

Researchers have created a model that uses a three-dimensional cellular platform to quickly evaluate several drug compounds simultaneously, enabling massive screens to find new, personalised treatments for cervical cancer. The way to change from the traditional means of testing medicines, which employed a single layer of cells, was reported in the study, which was headed by Oregon State University (OSU) College of Engineering, in the US.

Kaitlin Fogg, the lead scientist and assisting professor, OSU College of Engineering said, as nothing in our bodies resembles a single layer of cells on a piece of hard plastic, two-dimensional monolayer models are unable to accurately mimic the cancer microenvironment. According to Fogg, the cancer spread and the development of new blood arteries that tumours require are intrinsically three-dimensional processes that must pass through substances that more closely mimic the human body. The Journal of Biomedical Materials Research publishes the findings.

Due to their reliance on plates with 24 wells, many 3D testing procedures don’t line up well with conventional high-throughput cervical Neoplasm screening techniques, as per Fogg. High-throughput screening, or HTS, is the automated, concurrent evaluation of the potential therapeutic efficacy of several distinct compounds. 96-well plates are the industry standard for high-throughput screening.

The study’s technology uses plates the size of giant ice cube trays to house the substances to be analysed, which speeds up drug analysis because a huge “library” of substances can be screened rapidly and affordably. The objectives of the study were to a model to verify a tumour in a dish model that precisely resembles the milieu of a cervical cancer tumour and integrates with current high-throughput techniques and can measure cancer invasion and blood vessel creation over time, according to Fogg. According to her, the model permits the simultaneous examination of hundreds of medications and the quick identification of those that can stop cancer invasion and the growth of new blood vessels.

Fogg said, as of now, there is no medicine available to particularly treat cervical cancer, hence that’s important. According to the World Health Organization, with around 600,000 new cases identified each year, cervical cancer is the fourth most common cancer in women overall. Most frequently diagnosed in women between the ages of 35 and 44, cervical cancer seldom affects those under the age of 20. More than 20 per cent of occurrences involve women over 65, the majority of whom did not receive routine cervical cancer screening. The technology accommodates patient-to-patient variability and tracks cell behaviour in the tumour microenvironment, as per Fogg.