The heterogenous cytotoxic response of colon cancer cells is unrelated to phenotypic differentiation characteristics.

Six colon cancer cell lines segregated into three groups with distinct biological properties (i.e., morphological differentiation, DNA content, carcinoembryonic antigen production, etc.) were treated with ten antitumor drugs. Cytotoxic responses were heterogenous and not associated to biological grouping, in fact, for some drugs, the response of one member of the group resembled that of a member of another group rather than its group counterpart. Thus the most common phenotypic characteristics that identify colon cancer cells did not predict the cytotoxic response and do not appear useful for stratifying patients into categories with distinct responses to currently available chemotherapeutic agents.