Development of Genetically Engineered Bioluminescent Cancer Cell Lines

Despite overall improvements in cancer survivorship, some soft tissue sarcomas continue to show resistance to drugs like Doxorubicin (Dox). In order to develop new therapies to treat resistant cancers, it is useful to develop animal models of human disease. Essential to these in vivo models is the confirmation of tumor engraftment and tracking of tumor growth throughout the experiment. To reduce experimental variability and number of animals subjects used, recombinant DNA technology can be used to produce bioluminescent cancer cell lines. The bioluminescent cancer cells can then be used to locate and track tumor growth using in vivo imaging systems (IVIS). In order to facilitate future in vivo research, pGL4.13[luc2/SV40] plasmid vectors encoding the luciferase reporter gene were propagated and purified from E. coli cells. Subsequent extraction and electroporation of pGL4.13 into a variety of Dox-resistant and Dox-sensitive cancers will be used to create bioluminescent cell lines that are selected based on light production. Previously, bioluminescent HT1080-luc2 fibrosarcoma cells have been used by our lab to successfully localize and demonstrate tumor regression in response to anti-cancer drug treatment. In this study we will produce more bioluminescent cancer cell lines to advance our work to develop new anti-cancer drugs.