Isolation Of Tumor Subpopulations With Different Androgen Requirements From A Primary Human Prostate Cancer

1788Androgen deprivation therapy is the major treatment for advanced prostate cancer. Unfortunately, this treatment is not fully effective and tumors usually return in an androgen-independent form resistant to further hormone ablation therapy and other available regimens. Patients’ responses differ from case to case, ranging from <6 months to >10 yr, with a medium response of 18-24 months. One cause for this difference in response is thought to be the presence in a prostate cancer of subpopulations which differ in their androgen requirements, sensitivities and therapy resistance. Their isolation, identification and characterization would be useful to a better understanding of patients’ responses and development of improved therapy. We have previously shown that primary human prostate cancer tissues can, irrespective of their grade, be grown as subrenal capsule xenografts in immuno-deficient mice with high …