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Melissa Skala- "Optical metabolic imaging of cellular heterogeneity in cancer"

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Thursday, April 30, 2015
10:00 am - 11:00 am

Abnormal cellular metabolism is a hallmark of many diseases, yet there is an absence of quantitative methods to dynamically image metabolism with cellular-level resolution. Optical metabolic imaging (OMI) quantifies the fluorescence intensities and lifetimes of the metabolic co-enzymes NADH and FAD using two-photon microscopy. OMI is a label-free, high-resolution, quantitative tool for monitoring cellular metabolism within intact samples. In vivo OMI is sensitive to heterogeneous changes in cellular metabolism induced by clinically relevant anti-cancer therapies in mouse models of cancer. The ability to monitor these treatment-resistant sub-populations of cells in vivo is important for identifying and eliminating the particularly lethal cells that cause tumor recurrence and metastases. We have further developed a ¿tumor-in-a-dish¿ organoid platform to rapidly test multi-drug response using OMI. This platform has been validated in mouse models of breast cancer, and feasibility has been tested in human tumors with chemotherapies, targeted therapies, and experimental drugs. This attractive suite of metabolic imaging tools has significant implications for rapid cellular-level assessment of metabolic response to drug treatment (1) in vivo, (2) in high-throughput drug efficacy studies, and (3) as a clinical tool to plan individualized treatment regimens.

Contact: Ashley Rasmussen