ラットグリオーマ細胞の血管新生に及ぼす影響—新しいモデルを用いたin vitroでの研究

Angiogenesis Induced by Rat Glioma Cells in Vitro

I．はじめに

　腫瘍の成育のためには栄養血管が不可欠であり，中枢神経系の腫瘍，特に悪性グリオーマでは著明な血管増生をみることが多い．近年，脳血管内皮細胞の分離，培養が可能となり，血管新生のメカニズムに関しても種々の知見が得られつつある^7,9）．血管新生のメカニズムを解明し，それを抑制する因子を発見できれば，脳腫瘍治療の有効な手段となりうる^10）．従来血管新生の実験モデルとしてはin vivoのものが主体を占めていたが，今回著者らはdouble chamber co-culture systemを用いた新しいモデルを開発し，グリオーマ細胞の脳血管内皮細胞に対する影響，特に血管新生能に与える影響をin vitroで検討した．

Angiogenesis induced by rat glioma cells was ex-amined in vitro using a double chamber co-culture sys-tem. Cultured microvascular endothelial cells from Fisher 344 rat brain, rat C6 glioma cells and rat T9 gliosarcoma cells were used for this study. Endothelial cells, cultured on type I collagen, formed capillary-like structures. In the co-culture system, C6 glioma cells promoted this formation. On the other hand T9 gliosar-coma cells had no effect on it. The supernatants of C6 glioma cells and T9 gliosarcoma cells suppressed the pro-liferation of the endothelial cells. C6 glioma cells prob-ably produce and release soluble factors promoting angiogenesis. The proliferation of endothelial cells is thus suppressed while angiogenesis is made more intense. This in-vitro model is useful to elucidate the mechanism of tumor angiogenesis and to evaluate the promoting and inhibiting factors of angiogenesis.