Progressive growth of a human pleural mesothelioma xenografted to athymic rats and mice.

A human malignant pleural mesothelioma was xenografted serially in athymic nude Rowett rats for 27 passages during 33 months. After the two initial passages (P), the take rate during P3-9 was 100% (192/192). The tumour grew progressively during P3-9 in 99% (190/192) and regressed totally in 1% (2/192). The take rate for the tumour xenografted to athymic BALB/c mice was also 100% (17/17) and no regressions were observed. During serial passaging in nude rats, the tumour-volume doubling time (TD) decreased from 6 days in P2 to 3 days in P8-9 (P less than 0.001) and then remained around 3 days during P10-25. A TD of 11 days in P1 (man-mouse) for tumours grown in mice decreased during 10 passages in rats to 4 days (P less than 0.005) when the tumour was transplanted to mice in P11. Light microscopic morphology of the tumour was retained in rats and mice. We believe that our experimental tumour model using the nude rat as a carrier of the xenograft will be useful for studies of human mesothelioma.