Related Experiment Video
Updated: Mar 17, 2026
Minimally Invasive Establishment of Murine Orthotopic Bladder Xenografts
Published on: February 11, 2014
A Real-Time Non-invasive Auto-bioluminescent Urinary Bladder Cancer Xenograft Model
Bincy Anu John1, Tingting Xu2, Steven Ripp2,3
1Department of Biomedical and Diagnostic Sciences, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA.
Purpose:
The study was to develop an auto-bioluminescent urinary bladder cancer (UBC) xenograft animal model for pre-clinical research.
Procedure:
The study used a humanized, bacteria-originated lux reporter system consisting of six (luxCDABEfrp) genes to express components required for producing bioluminescent signals in human UBC J82, J82-Ras, and SW780 cells without exogenous substrates. Immune-deficient nude mice were inoculated with Lux-expressing UBC cells to develop auto-bioluminescent xenograft tumors that were monitored by imaging and physical examination.
Results:
Lux-expressing auto-bioluminescent J82-Lux, J82-Ras-Lux, and SW780-Lux cell lines were established. Xenograft tumors derived from tumorigenic Lux-expressing auto-bioluminescent J82-Ras-Lux cells allowed a serial, non-invasive, real-time monitoring by imaging of tumor development prior to the presence of palpable tumors in animals.
Conclusions:
Using Lux-expressing auto-bioluminescent tumorigenic cells enabled us to monitor the entire course of xenograft tumor development through tumor cell implantation, adaptation, and growth to visible/palpable tumors in animals.
