Successful growth of fresh retinoblastoma cells in chorioallantoic membrane

Silvia L Fialho; Bárbara R Silvestrini; Juliana Vieira; Mayara R B Paiva; Luciana M Silva; Fernando Chahud; Armando Silva-Cunha; Zelia M Correa; Rodrigo Jorge

doi:10.1186/s40942-020-00236-x

Successful growth of fresh retinoblastoma cells in chorioallantoic membrane

Int J Retina Vitreous. 2020 Jul 29:6:33. doi: 10.1186/s40942-020-00236-x. eCollection 2020.

Authors

Silvia L Fialho¹, Bárbara R Silvestrini¹, Juliana Vieira², Mayara R B Paiva¹, Luciana M Silva³, Fernando Chahud⁴, Armando Silva-Cunha⁵, Zelia M Correa^{6

7}, Rodrigo Jorge²

Affiliations

¹ Pharmaceutical Research and Development, Ezequiel Dias Foundation, Belo Horizonte, Brazil.
² Department of Ophthalmology, Ribeirão Preto Medical School, University of São Paulo, Ribeirão Preto, Brazil.
³ Department of Cell Biology, Ezequiel Dias Foundation, Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais Brazil.
⁴ Department of Pathology, Ribeirão Preto Medical School, University of São Paulo, Ribeirão Preto, Brazil.
⁵ School of Pharmacy, Federal University of Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Brazil.
⁶ Department of Ophthalmology, Wilmer Eye Institute, Johns Hopkins Medicine, Baltimore, MD USA.
⁷ Department of Ophthalmology, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, Cincinnati, OH USA.

Abstract

The authors developed a retinoblastoma model using fresh harvested cells from an enucleated eye that were transplanted in chick embryos (chorioallantoic membrane model). The transplanted embryos were treated with escalating doses of Melphalan. This exploratory model was developed with the goal of testing drug sensitivity. Our findings suggest this tumor model could be employed to personalize treatment for patients with retinoblastoma, especially those with bilateral and more refractory disease.

Keywords: CAM assay; Chorioallantoic membrane; Retinoblastoma; Tumor models.