Australian and British scientists have bred a mouse that lets them watch pancreatic cancer cells spread in real time, in a development that could combat early stages of cancer in humans.
Parts of the biosensor mouse’s internal organs glow when viewed through a fluorescence microscope.
The Garvan Institute of Medical Research’s Dr Paul Timpson, who co-led the research, said scientists took a molecule which holds normal cells together, or binds cancer cells to a specific site, and cloned it with a green fluorescent protein from jellyfish.
Scientists can see if the cancer is about to spread by observing which parts of the mouse glow.
“We can monitor this molecule moving and unzipping at a molecular level before cancer actually spreads,” Dr Timpson said.
“This tells us the cancer is preparing to spread and we can use this to use new drugs to stop the spread of that cancer.”
It is hoped that the development could lead to the creation of more effective anti-cancer drugs and insight into how to treat early-stage pancreatic cancer patients.
Dr Timpson said it could also be used to allow researchers and pharmaceutical companies to test the effectiveness of their drugs.
He said it would help prevent false positive or negative results in cancer testing.
“Sometimes you think you’ve got a drug and it doesn’t do what you think it’s going to in a real system,” he said.
Dr Timpson said by containing the cancer, surgeons could then extract the primary tumour.
The biosensor mouse is now being used on breast, colon and prostate cancers.
Scientists also hope to use it on other diseases.