Autologous confrontation of brain tumor derived spheroids with human dermal spheroids.

An in vitro model is presented to test the invasiveness of human brain tumour derived cells. Spheroids of brain tumours are confronted with autologous spheroids of human dermal fibroblasts. Aggregates of seven tested brain tumours, respectively 5 benign and 2 malignant ones are confronted for 7 days in vitro. The aggregates of the malignant tumours do invade into the dermal spheroids and progressive replacement of the dermal aggregate is observed. The aggregates of the benign tumours do not invade, a clearcut border between the tumour compartment and the dermal one is seen. This model will be applied for clinical testing of the invasiveness of selected tumours and will offer a good model to study mechanisms of invasion.