Cancer Research - Europa

Scientifi c Model Systems
The complexity of cancer initiation and progression combined with heterogeneity of diff erent cancers
presents a big challenge to researchers studying this disease. In order to overcome these diffi culties
cancer research often has to rely on model systems that can be used as examples of other systems that
are more diffi cult to study directly. Good model systems have to be suffi ciently simple to be studied, but
at the same time suffi ciently complex to allow for generalisation of the study results. The model systems
have to mimic the problem under investigation and to be reproducible. Advantages of their use in cancer
research include time and cost effi ciency and relative ease to control for the factors involved. Development
and characterization of new model systems – be it living organisms or computer software capable
of reproducing some processes involved in cancer biology or investigating potential treatments – and
technologies that facilitate their use is of the utmost importance in current cancer research.
This area of research is represented by two projects that answer to the need for better cancer models
in very diff erent ways. ESBIC-D is a Coordination Action that aims to establish a framework for a systems
biology approach to combat cancer by creating a network of partners with diff erent expertise on
the European level. ZF-Tools is a STREP project aiming to develop and characterize a zebrafi sh model
system that could be used as a high-throughput screening tool in drug discovery research.
Dominika Trzaska