Construction of Clinically Relevant Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Model in Athymic Nude Mice using 3D Spheroids of A549-iRFP Cells

Lung cancer is the top killer cancer in the US. Monolayer cultures of lung cancer cells and their animal xenografts are major models for testing therapeutic modalities against lung cancer. Injection of suspended cancer cells into the lung is one of the most common approaches to build an orthotopic lung cancer model but carry several significant disadvantages, including the omission of a primary solid tumor and the artificial metastasis generated from the premature leakage of the injected cell suspension [1]. All such drawbacks could severely mislead the development of new therapies against lung cancer. Compared to cell monolayers or cell suspensions in culture, three-dimension (3D) cancer cell spheroids better mimic the tumor microenvironment [2]