C10 - Sunday, April 29, 1984 - North Shore News Looking for cancer cure THE WOMAN undergoing radium treatment for cancer of the cervix hardly noticed as the young researcher removed some cells from the area being implanted with the radium.. The cancer was very ad- vanced and the patient sur- vived for only six months, but more than 20 years later, her cells live on in laboratories all over the world where the fight against cancer continues. Back in 1961, finding enough tissue for research was a constant time- consuming problem and Dr. Nelly Auersperg was quick to realize the value of cells that could be kept in the laboratory for use as and when needed. She applied for and obtain- ed from the National Cancer Institute of Canada (NCIC) funding to develop a method by which cells that continued to resemble the cancer from which they came could be maimtained and grown for decades. She succeeded - so well that she still hears today from doctors in other coun- tries who are working with the descendants of those first cells. Working out of the Department of Anatomy at the University of B.C., Dr. Auersperg’s chief area of in- terest in 1984 is cancer cell biology - the study of cancer cells themselves and their relationship to normal cells. “One of the biggest pro- blems in the control of cancer,’’ she explains, ‘‘is that cancer cells are very similar to normal cells and it’s hard to treat one without affecting the other. We’re always tooking for dif- ferences between them that can be exploited. ‘‘Cancer cells vary, even among themselves. Within one organ — even within one tumor — cells vary in their growth requirements and growth rate. A tumor will change even with time, mak- ing it harder to treat.”” Dr. Auersperg's efforts to determine the basis, at the cellular level, for the diversity among cancer cells involve two separate areas of study. One uses human cells; the other uses rat cells. *“*We take human cells ob- tained trom tumor biopsies and grow them in culture — that 1s, in an environment that is greatly simplified in comparison to the body in which they first formed. The growth pattern varies. The cells in a cervical tumor, for example, may be clumped together or they may be spread out, We want to know if that growth pattern is dif- ferent when the cells are grown outside the body and, one to eight weeks later. if so, why? Dr. Auersperg is. par- ““A study we’ve just com- ticularly interested in - gene pleted indicates that proper- regulation. ‘‘We know that ues of the cell surface may cancer cells in the body are all account for changes that do different from one another, take place. If this is so, but we don’t know to what perhaps we can alter the sur- extent this is determined by face structure of the cell and characteristics of the cells treat the tumor.”’ themselves and to what ex- in another area of Dr. tent it’s determined by the Auersperg’s lab, normal cells cell's environment.”’ taken from rats are infected An example of gene with a cancer virus. Examina- _ regulation was contained in a uon shows that the virus is paper published by Dr. taken up by the cells within Auersperg in 1981, which hours. The cells become described a study of ovarian malignant anywhere from cells. ‘*We discovered we Cll - Sunday, April 29, 1984 - North Shore News could infect certain cells with a certain virus, but it took the addition of a hormone to make the cell become malig- nant. The cells did not ac- quire the characteristics of malignant cells unless the hormone was added.’ Another aspect of Dr. Auersperg’s work involves growing cells from the ovary. Eighty per cent of ovarian cancers develop in the surface cells, which are extremely hard to isolate for study. Dr. Auersperg is very pro- ud that it was a former stu- dent of hers who developed a method for growing rat ovary surface epithelium. Growing human ovary surface epithelium with which to work is) difficult. With the help of funding from the National Cancer In- stitute of Canada, Dr. Auersperg is developing a method to grow the cells which give rise tO most ovarian cancers. This will provide the scientific com- munity with the first ex- perimental model to. in- vestigate causes of ovarian cancer. For info call 879-5736. 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