Cell Chemical Biology
Volume 24, Issue 9, 21 September 2017, Pages 1092-1100
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Review
Tumor Organoids as a Pre-clinical Cancer Model for Drug Discovery

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Tumor organoids are 3D cultures of cancer cells that can be derived on an individual patient basis with a high success rate. This creates opportunities to build large biobanks with relevant patient material that can be used to perform drug screens and facilitate drug development. The high take rate will also allow side-by-side comparison to evaluate the translational potential of this model system to the patient. These tumors-in-a-dish can be established for a variety of tumor types including colorectal, pancreas, stomach, prostate, and breast cancers. In this review, we highlight what is currently known about tumor organoid culture, the advantages and challenges of the model system, compare it with other pre-clinical cancer models, and evaluate its value for drug development.

Keywords

tumor organoids
three-dimensional culture
cell line
patient-derived xenograft
PDX
drug development
biobank
drug screen
patient-derived tumor organoids

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5

These authors contributed equally