Ultrasonography-guided intracardiac injection: an improvement for quantitative brain colonization assays.

Brain metastasis is a frequent occurrence in patients with cancer, with devastating consequences. The current animal models for brain metastasis are highly variable, leading to a need for improved in vivo models that recapitulate the clinical disease. Herein, we describe an experimental brain metast...

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Main Authors: Balathasan, L, Beech, J, Muschel, R
Format: Journal article
Language:English
Published: 2013
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author Balathasan, L
Beech, J
Muschel, R
author_facet Balathasan, L
Beech, J
Muschel, R
author_sort Balathasan, L
collection OXFORD
description Brain metastasis is a frequent occurrence in patients with cancer, with devastating consequences. The current animal models for brain metastasis are highly variable, leading to a need for improved in vivo models that recapitulate the clinical disease. Herein, we describe an experimental brain metastasis model that uses ultrasonographic guidance to perform intracardiac injections. This method is easy to perform, giving consistent and quantitative results. Demonstrating the utility of this method, we have assessed a variety of metastatic cell lines for their ability to develop into brain metastases. Those cell lines that were competent at brain colonization could be detected in the brain vasculature 4 hours after intracardiac injection, and a few adherent cells persisted until colonization occurred. In contrast, those cell lines that were deficient in brain colonization were infrequently found 4 hours after introduction into the arterial circulation and were not detected at later time points. All of these cells were capable of brain colonization after intraparenchymal injection. We propose that adherence to the brain vasculature may be the key limiting step that determines the ability of a cancer cell to form brain metastases successfully. Identifying brain endothelium-specific adhesion molecules may enable development of screening modalities to detect brain-colonizing cancer cells and therapies to prevent these metastatic cells from seeding the brain.
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spelling oxford-uuid:f7a47fb2-b9f0-4788-bdf4-6aabcf306e882022-03-27T12:44:15ZUltrasonography-guided intracardiac injection: an improvement for quantitative brain colonization assays.Journal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_dcae04bcuuid:f7a47fb2-b9f0-4788-bdf4-6aabcf306e88EnglishSymplectic Elements at Oxford2013Balathasan, LBeech, JMuschel, RBrain metastasis is a frequent occurrence in patients with cancer, with devastating consequences. The current animal models for brain metastasis are highly variable, leading to a need for improved in vivo models that recapitulate the clinical disease. Herein, we describe an experimental brain metastasis model that uses ultrasonographic guidance to perform intracardiac injections. This method is easy to perform, giving consistent and quantitative results. Demonstrating the utility of this method, we have assessed a variety of metastatic cell lines for their ability to develop into brain metastases. Those cell lines that were competent at brain colonization could be detected in the brain vasculature 4 hours after intracardiac injection, and a few adherent cells persisted until colonization occurred. In contrast, those cell lines that were deficient in brain colonization were infrequently found 4 hours after introduction into the arterial circulation and were not detected at later time points. All of these cells were capable of brain colonization after intraparenchymal injection. We propose that adherence to the brain vasculature may be the key limiting step that determines the ability of a cancer cell to form brain metastases successfully. Identifying brain endothelium-specific adhesion molecules may enable development of screening modalities to detect brain-colonizing cancer cells and therapies to prevent these metastatic cells from seeding the brain.
spellingShingle Balathasan, L
Beech, J
Muschel, R
Ultrasonography-guided intracardiac injection: an improvement for quantitative brain colonization assays.
title Ultrasonography-guided intracardiac injection: an improvement for quantitative brain colonization assays.
title_full Ultrasonography-guided intracardiac injection: an improvement for quantitative brain colonization assays.
title_fullStr Ultrasonography-guided intracardiac injection: an improvement for quantitative brain colonization assays.
title_full_unstemmed Ultrasonography-guided intracardiac injection: an improvement for quantitative brain colonization assays.
title_short Ultrasonography-guided intracardiac injection: an improvement for quantitative brain colonization assays.
title_sort ultrasonography guided intracardiac injection an improvement for quantitative brain colonization assays
work_keys_str_mv AT balathasanl ultrasonographyguidedintracardiacinjectionanimprovementforquantitativebraincolonizationassays
AT beechj ultrasonographyguidedintracardiacinjectionanimprovementforquantitativebraincolonizationassays
AT muschelr ultrasonographyguidedintracardiacinjectionanimprovementforquantitativebraincolonizationassays