NIH/NCATS and InSphero Host Inaugural 3D Tumor Model Standards Working Group at AACR 2017
Establishing standards for next-generation tumor models to benefit drug discovery and broader research community primary objective of new group.
Schlieren, Switzerland – April 18, 2017
The inaugural meeting of the 3D Standards Working Group was held during the American Association of Cancer Research (AACR) Annual Meeting in Washington, DC, on Saturday, April 1. Organized and hosted by the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS), part of the National Institutes of Health, and InSphero AG, the meeting drew representatives from academic institutions, pharmaceutical, and life sciences industries, as well as government agencies, to discuss the use of 3D cancer models within drug discovery campaigns, and review biological and technical requirements needed for the next generation of high-throughput screening-compatible (HTS) models.
“There is a growing need for in vitro 3D tumor models that mimic in vivo tumor physiology for more efficient cancer drug discovery,” says InSphero Chief Scientific Officer Dr. Patrick Guye. “We sought to bring together key opinion leaders in academia, industry, and government to develop guidelines that we believe are critical to establishing 3D tumor models as a highly predictive platform for therapeutic drug development assays.” The group plans to publish its findings and recommendations for developing and using 3D tumor models for drug development, with the intent to make the best consensus information available to the broader research community.
“We made tremendous progress during this kickoff meeting,” says Dr. Madhu Lal Nag, Head of the Trans NIH RNAi Facility at NCATS. “We not only discussed where we stand today, with regard to developing advanced 3D models that capture the complexity of the tumor microenvironment, but also delved into needs for standardized nomenclature, benchmarking, improved model predictivity, and multiparametric readouts.” Going forward, the 3D Standards Working Group plans to meet quarterly by teleconference and in person during future conferences, such as AACR, which most members of the working group attend.
For more information about NCATS, visit https://ncats.nih.gov.
