ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a brief survey of the methods for culturing multicellular tumor spheroids and explains how tumor spheroids can be used in various experimental studies. It describes the composition of the extracellular matrix during tumor cell growth in monolayer, spheroid, and allograft cultures. Cell culture in spinner flasks has been the most widely used method for culturing spheroids and was originally introduced by Moscona. Growth of spheroids in medium-agar overlay culture was first described by Yuhas. By basecoating the culture plastic with a mixture of agar and growth medium, nutrients from the growth medium are evenly presented to the spheroids. Small pieces of biopsy material from surgically removed tumors may form spheroids within a few days in agar overlay culture, thus maintaining a preserved biomatrix and a cellular composition representative for the tumor invivo. Tumor cells that grow out from spheroids that are placed on a plastic surface give information on cell viability, motility, and proliferation.
