Metastatic human pleural ovarian cancer model constructed by orthotopic implantation of fresh histologically-intact patient carcinoma in nude mice.

Pleural cancer is a frequently-occurring tumor that is generally refractory to therapy. Clinically-relevant animal models of human pleural cancer are greatly needed for testing experimental and standard treatments, as well as for understanding the clinical features of this disease. We report the first orthotopic transplant model for human patient pleural cancer. Fresh histologically-intact patient specimens of human pleural ovarian adenocarcinoma were implanted onto the visceral and parietal pleura of nude mouse. The human tumors grew locally and regionally mimicking the usual human clinical features of this disease. Moreover, only visceral pleural implantation subsequently involved mediastinal lymph nodes corroborating clinical observations suggesting that visceral pleural involvement in pleural cancer represents an advanced-stage disease. This model should facilitate basic research of pleural malignancies, and stimulate studies of pleural-tumor response to cytotoxic treatment, biologic modifiers, and other modalities of therapy.