[Growth of tumour-cell colonies from human solid tumours (author's transl)]

In-vitro growth of tumour-cell colonies of various human solid carcinomas was investigated. Cell-colony formation in-vitro was achieved from single cells in 46 of 81 tumour specimens. The proportion of tumour-cell colonies per number of cultured tumour cells ("cloning efficiency") thus was 1-8 per 1000. Tumour-cell colonies of various carcinomas differed in their morphological appearance, with characteristic cytological in-vitro. Growth of tumour-cell colonies opens up the possibility of performing cytostatic drug sensitivity tests on defined tumour-cell populations of a given individual tumour. Under the influence of various cytostatic drugs tumour-cell colony numbers could be reduced by more than 30% in 27 of 46 tested carcinomas compared with untreated controls.