Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2017 Aug;9(4):321-327.
doi: 10.1007/s12551-017-0276-4. Epub 2017 Jul 26.

Advances in the development of improved animal-free models for use in breast cancer biomedical research

Sophie Roberts  1 , Valerie Speirs  2
Affiliations
Review

Advances in the development of improved animal-free models for use in breast cancer biomedical research

Sophie Roberts et al. Biophys Rev. 2017 Aug.

Abstract

Through translational research, the outcomes for women (and men) diagnosed with breast cancer have improved significantly, with now over 80% of women surviving for at least 5 years post-diagnosis. Much of this success has been translated from the bench to the bedside using laboratory models. Here, we outline the types of laboratory models that have helped achieve this and discuss new approaches as we move towards animal-free disease modelling.

Keywords: Breast cancer; Ex vivo models; Tissue banks.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of interest

Sophie Roberts declares that she has no conflict of interest.

Ethical approval

This article does not contain any studies with human participants or animals performed by any of the authors.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Advancements of breast cancer models over time. The timeline presents the fundamental breakthroughs in breast cancer models over time. 1Cardiff and Kenney (2011), 2Lasfargues and Ozzello (1958), 3Deome et al. (1959), 4Rygaard and Povsen (2007), 5Sutherland et al. (1970), 6Soule et al. (1973), 7Stampfer et al. (1980), 8Petersen et al. (1992), 9Abbott (2003a, b), 10Beckhove et al. (2003), 11Behbod et al. (2009), 12BCN, 13Nash et al. (2015), 14van de Wetering et al. (2015), 15Carter et al. (2017). Image adapted from Holen et al. (2017)
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Interrogation of PubMed (2 June 2017) shows that the number of publications reporting 3D cell culture has overtaken that of 2D culture and continues to grow exponentially
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Interrogation of PubMed (2 June 2017) shows that the use of breast cancer cell line MCF-7 far exceeds the use of all other breast cancer cell lines in biomedical research
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Abbott A. Goodbye, flat biology? Nature. 2003;424:861. - PubMed
    1. Abbott A. Cell culture: biology’s new dimension. Nature. 2003;424:870–872. doi: 10.1038/424870a. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Augustine TN, Dix-Peek T, Duarte R, Candy GP. Establishment of a heterotypic 3D culture system to evaluate the interaction of TREG lymphocytes and NK cells with breast cancer. J Immunol Methods. 2015;426:1–13. doi: 10.1016/j.jim.2015.07.003. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Beckhove P, Schütz F, Diel IJ, Solomayer E-F, Bastert G, Foerster J, Feuerer M, Bai L, Sinn H-P, Umansky V, Schirrmacher V. Efficient engraftment of human primary breast cancer transplants in nonconditioned NOD/Scid mice. Int J Cancer. 2003;105:444–453. doi: 10.1002/ijc.11125. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Behbod F, Kittrell FS, LaMarca H, Edwards D, Kerbawy S, Heestand JC, Young E, Mukhopadhyay P, Yeh H-W, Allred DC, Hu M, Polyak K, Rosen JM, Medina D. An intraductal human-in-mouse transplantation model mimics the subtypes of ductal carcinoma in situ. Breast Cancer Res. 2009;11:R66. doi: 10.1186/bcr2358. - DOI - PMC - PubMed