Currently, the most commonly used model in tumor research is tumor cells grown in 2D culture dishes. However, this model lacks the interaction between tumor and stroma and cannot accurately simulate the complex biological environment of tumor growth. This is also the main reason why many anti-tumor drugs show good results in the laboratory but fail to perform well in clinical trials. To address this, a team of Israeli scientists used 3D printing technology to create a model that can simulate various biological characteristics of neuroblastoma. This research was published in the journal *Science Advances*, titled: "Microengineered perfusable 3D-bioprinted glioblastoma model for in vivo mimicry of tumor microenvironment."
Scientists have constructed a tumor microenvironment using fibrin-glioblastoma bio-ink composed of glioblastoma cells, astrocytes, and microglia, and created perfusionable blood vessels using bio-ink containing pericytes and endothelial cells. Researchers observed that this 3D bioprinted model can simulate the cellular heterogeneity, intercellular interactions, and spatial tomographic features of glioblastoma, and can reproduce various in vivo characteristics of glioblastoma, including growth dynamics, invasiveness, treatment response, and genetic features.
Researchers believe that this 3D bioprinted model can better simulate clinical scenarios for various cancer types and has the potential to become a reliable technological platform for preclinical research and drug screening.
