Canadian mice first to be grafted with human leukemia

Canadian scientists said Friday they have grown a human cancer from scratch in a lab mouse for the first time, allowing researchers to examine its progression from start to finish.

The animal model, which researchers have pursued for years, could "translate into more effective therapies," John Dick, the lead author of the study and a senior scientist at Princess Margaret Hospital, told AFP.

"By just studying the tumor at the end, we didn't know how the tumor was created," he said.
This crucial new tool could help scientists "better understand the whole process and more rationally target the critical pathways to eradicate these cells that lie at the heart of the cancer," he said.

The study was published Friday in the journal Science.

Previously, researchers would engineer mice to develop cancer, but it was the animal form of the disease. They could also implant human cancers into mice, but missed how the disease originated.

By inserting just one cancerous gene into human stem cells, Dick and his colleagues were able to seed leukemia in specially bred lab mice.

"We haven't proven it, but we believe this process could be used for other cancers too," Dick said.

The same team of scientists were the first to isolate cancer stem cells in acute myeloid leukemia in 1994.