Figure 1: Growth behaviour of BM- and lung-derived DTCs. | Nature Cell Biology

Figure 1: Growth behaviour of BM- and lung-derived DTCs.

From: TGF-β2 dictates disseminated tumour cell fate in target organs through TGF-β-RIII and p38α/β signalling

Figure 1

(a) Phase-contrast and GFP-channel images of a single DTC in a BM flush (upper left panel) and a lung metastasis (upper right panel) 3 wk after primary tumour surgery. Scale bars, 40 μm (BM) and 400 μm (lung). S, stroma. Lower left panel: fluorescence images of lung stroma and a micro-metastasis in a freshly resected lung. Lower right panel: laser scanning confocal image of a DTC cluster in lung. Scale bars, 160 μm (left) and 20 μm (right). n = 16 (BM), 35 (LU) mice. (b) Number of HEp3–GFP DTCs found in lungs and BM after primary tumour surgery (n = 5 mice per time per condition). (c) Tumour volume of PT-HEp3-, Lu-HEp3- and BM-HEp3-derived cell lines from mice, after 1 week on CAM. (n = 5 (Lu6), 5 (Lu7), 4 (PT-2), 7 (PT-4), 5 (BM-T1), 5 (BM-D1) tumours). (d) Phospho-histone3 (P-H3; left column) and p27 (right column) staining in BM-D1 (upper panels) tumour nodules and Lu-7 (lower panels) tumours grown on CAMs. Scale bar, 40 μm. Arrows, positive cells. Lower panel: quantification of P-H3+ and p27+ cells (n = 100 cells assessed per section. 15 sections assessed from 3 different tumours per condition). FOV, field of view. (e) Weight of BM-D1 tumour nodules on CAMs. BM-D1 cells were inoculated into CAM (5×105 cells per animal) and transplanted into a new CAM every week (n = 3 (week 1), 5 (week 2), 5 (week 3), 5 (week 4), 3 (week 5), 4 (week 6), 2 (week 7), 3 (week 8) tumours per time point). (f) Number of tumour cells per CAM nodule produced by primary tumour (PT-HEp3) and BM-DTC cell lines (BM-HEp3) derived from an avian source after 1 week on CAM (n = 4 (BM-D2), 3 (BM-D3), 4 (BM-D4), 10 (PT), 5 (BM-D5), 5 (BM-T2), 4 (BM-T3), 2 (BM-D6), 3 (BM-D7), 3 (BM-D8) tumours). See Supplementary Table S4 for statistic source data. Data in a,b and d, represent mean±s.e.m. In b and d, *P<0.05, **P<0.01 and +++P<0.001 by Mann–Whitney test. In c and f, *P<0.05, **P<0.01 and ***P<0.001 by one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) with Bonferroni’s multiple comparison test, and in e, **P<0.01 by unpaired t-test. NS, not significant.

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