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This month the National Cancer Research Institute (NCRI) conference took place in Glasgow. Attracting around 1200 attendees, the conference aims to discuss the latest trends in cancer research and to encourage scientific collaboration worldwide. Ximbio attended to keep up-to-date with emerging technologies and to identify new research tools that may benefit from being deposited with Ximbio. Hosted across three days at the Scottish Event Campus, the programme included a diverse range of topics. Our session highlights included:   

3D models to better study cancer

The NCRI conference programme highlighted the increasing use of organoids and tumoroids as models. In comparison to 2D cell culture-based systems, organoids and tumoroids provide a more physiologically relevant model to study cancer dynamics and interventions. This included not only working with organoids in vitro, but also in vivo. An example of this was a session by Professor Owen Sansom of the Beatson Institute for Cancer Research, Glasgow, describing the introduction of colorectal cancer organoids into the rectum of mice, to better study cancer progression and responses to treatment.

Investigating the link between obesity and cancer

Stephen Hursting spoke about the obesity cancer link within his session. With obesity an important risk factor for 13 cancer types, Hursting asked “How can we empower future research to reduce the burden of obesity associated cancers?". He also discussed how we can better incorporate cell culture, animal models and human research on obesity and Cancer. 

Focusing on: Organoids

It was good to see a project all about increasing the availability of research tools, the Human Cell Model Initiative (HCMI), win the NCRI innovation award. This programme aims to develop a bank of organoid cultures for research use from patient cancer samples. The consortium partners include Cancer Research UK, the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute (WTSI), the US National Institute of Health (NIH) and the American Type Culture Collection (ATCC). When accepting the award, Matthew Garnett, Translational Cancer Genomics Group Leader at WTSI, described the results of more than three and a half years of research: Over 450 tumour samples have been processed with 130 tumour organoids produced from colon, pancreas and oesophageal cancers and at present 10 tumour organoids from this project are now available from ATCC to order. 

Focusing on : ORganoids
Vivian Li from the Francis Crick Institute also discussed organoids in her session, describing her group’s efforts to perform organoid transplantation. Li points out that organoids are highly regenerative and can be grafted to damaged tissues (although, she noted that data supporting this occurrence is currently limited). Li further described a method by which organoids are transplanted to decellularized organs; even complex architectures can be subjected to the process of decellularization. Li gave the example of a decellularized small bowel scaffold from rat, demonstrated by Paolo De Coppia from the Institute of Child Health and Great Ormond Street Hospital.  In the same session, Calvin Kuo of the University of Stanford described the modelling of the tumour micro environment in organoids and their application for modelling novel immunotherapies. He concluded that organoids allow primary cultures of wild-type tissues and tumours from diverse organs, allowing “bottom-up” modelling for cancer gene discovery and cancer biology investigations in wild-type tissues.

How do you make the best cancer cell killers?

Professor Gillian Griffiths showed captivating videos of a cytotoxic T cell engaging with a cancer cell and delivering its payload in her session of the conference. The payload consists of secretory lysosomes containing perforin and other factors that trigger the cancer cell to commit cell suicide, known as apoptosis. Professor Griffiths’ group, based at the Cancer Research UK Cambridge Research Institute, is studying how to fine tune the T-cell as a cancer assassin, by focusing on how the T cells identify cancer cells and the size of their payload. 

Cancer and its surrounding environment

The environmental context of cancer is a significant area of research interest i.e. the identity of, and how, the non-cancer cells that infiltrate and surround cancer cells may promote or impede proliferation of the cancer cells. This is why a novel metastatic niche-labelling plasmid, presented at the NCRI conference by Luigi Ombrato, from Ilaria Malanchi’s research group, based at the Francis Crick Institute, has attracted much attention. Cell lines stably transfected with the plasmid release a cell-penetrating fluorescent protein which is taken up by neighbouring cells. This enables spatial identification of the local metastatic cellular environment. This plasmid is proving very popular and we have been inundated with requests for it. For more information on this plasmid, visit our website. 

Cancer and its surrounding environment

The shape of things to come: Emerging Technologies

A session on emerging technologies for the study of cancer biology, included a presentation by Molly Stevens, Professor of Biomedical Materials and Regenerative Medicine at Imperial College, who described how cell shape and geometry can act as regulators for cell physiology, stem cell signalling and fate. By printing a cell substrate in a triangular shape, a stem cell will adopt the same shape, have greater stiffness and be more prone to differentiate into bone in comparison to a cell in a circular shape.   

Hagan Bayley from the University of Oxford presented on emerging technologies for cancer research and showcased a 3D tissue printing technology with the goal to fabricate microtumours for the evaluation of precision therapies; work which has received funding through a Cancer Research UK Pioneer Award. These microtumours could be generated from individual patient’s cells and be used to examine their potential response to therapies. This would help determine what treatment is likely to be most effective for an individual patient.

The 3D tissue printing process involves advanced microfluidics, with each cell inside its own oil drop. These arranged droplets then respond to external stimuli to bring about defined responses/effects. Only a few thousand cells are required and uniform microtumours with more than one cell type can be established. The ultimate aim from this technology is to 3D print tumour cells with customised microenvironments, which could serve as alternatives to organoid/spheroid cancer models.


The shape of things to come: Emerging Technologies

With such a variety of new topics and trends taking place in the cancer research environment we look forward to seeing how all this research progresses over the next year. In the meantime, to find out how we can support you in your cancer research, why not get in touch?