Elucidating the mechanism of human cancer metastasis using a humanized cancer metastasis model.

当免疫缺陷小鼠被用作人类癌症转移模型时，细胞系的转移潜力在不同于人类的微环境中进行评估。为了建立更准确地反映人类肿瘤在体内转移现象的模型，我们采用人肝细胞重组肝脏的人源化小鼠作为宿主动物，在异体微环境中研究宿主靶组织与移植细胞之间的关系。即使在传统的异种移植模型中没有或极低转移潜力的细胞系在该模型中也发生了转移。结果表明同种异体关系在移植模型中的重要性。

When immunodeficient mice are used as a human cancer metastasis model, the metastatic potential of cell lines is evaluated in a microenvironment that differs from that of humans. To develop a model that reflects the phenomenon of human cancer metastasis in vivo more accurately, humanized mice in which the liver was reconstituted with human liver cells were used as the host animals to examine the relationship between host target tissue and transplanted cells in an allogeneic microenvironment. Even cell lines with no or extremely low metastatic potential in traditional xeno-transplantation models metastasized in this model. The results suggest the importance of allogeneic relationships in transplant models.