Project Leader: Dr. Izhak Haviv
Peter Mac Laboratory Head: Dr R. Anderson..
A major new area of research in cancer involves the interplay between cancer cells and normal cells, collectively termed stroma, in their vicinity. Researchers have shown that the adjacent normal cells are not uninvolved bystanders, but are major contributors to the rate of growth of the cancer and its spread. Biochemical and genetic analyses show that cytokines (cell hormones) and enzymes secreted by stromal elements are vital for invasion and metastasis.
To analyse intercellular signalling in tissue invasion, a novel co-culture system was devised, which exploited cDNA micro-array expression profiling to monitor global changes in gene expression. The collected profiles are subsequently analysed using standard statistical and custom designed data mining algorithms. Many of the gene expression changes seen in whole tumours are recapitulated when certain cell combinations are created in vitro. The co-culture system therefore allows identification of the sources of gene expression signatures in tumours and provides a highly manipulable in vitro experimental system to evaluate complex patterns observed in vivo.