"Histological examination, which is widely used by pathologists to diagnose oncological diseases, allows us to obtain only flat, two—dimensional sections of the tumor and surrounding healthy tissues," Sergey Tkachev, head of the study and a junior researcher at the University's Institute of Regenerative Medicine, told Izvestia.
According to him, histological examination is considered the gold standard of diagnosis for accurate diagnosis of diseases, however, on flat sections it is impossible to trace exactly how the neoplasm spreads in living tissue. Therefore, specialists have significantly increased the accuracy of imaging tumor progression by combining microtomography and histology.
Graphical abstract. By Tkachev at al / Cancers, 2025
Scientists have modeled the development of squamous cell carcinoma of the esophagus: tumor fragments obtained from the patient were transplanted into immunodeficient mice, which allowed them to reproduce the process of invasion and metastasis. Using X-ray microtomography and histological examination of comparable areas of interest, the researchers were able to study in detail how cancer cells penetrate into surrounding tissues, form metastases and interact with the microenvironment.
The findings open up new possibilities for the development of therapeutic strategies aimed at disrupting the cyclical invasion process. Targeted drugs that affect leader cells or adaptive plasticity mechanisms may become key in the fight against metastatic tumors, experts from Sechenov University emphasized.
The study was supported by the Russian Science Foundation (grant No 24-25-00475) and published in the journal Cancers (edited by RSF PR Department).
