{"entity":{"id":"tumour-spheroid-models","kind":"technology","name":"Tumour spheroid models (hanging-drop and ultra-low-attachment culture)","aka":["multicellular tumour spheroids","multicellular tumor spheroids","MCTS","spheroid models","hanging-drop spheroids","ultra-low-attachment spheroids","3D spheroid culture"],"tldr":"Instead of growing cancer cells flat on plastic, they are grown as small balls of a few thousand cells. The balls develop an outer layer of dividing cells and a starved centre, much like a small tumour nodule, which makes them a better test of how drugs get in and act.","summary":"Sutherland, McCredie and Inch described multicell spheroids as a model of nodular carcinoma in 1971. Spheroids form when cells are prevented from attaching to a surface, so they aggregate and grow in three dimensions, building oxygen, nutrient and proliferation gradients with a necrotic core once they pass a few hundred micrometres. Kelm and colleagues (2003) described the hanging-drop method, in which each spheroid forms in a drop suspended from a microtitre plate: it worked across a broad range of cell lines with nearly one spheroid per drop and a narrow size distribution (coefficient of variation 10 to 15 per cent, against 40 to 60 per cent for growth on non-adherent surfaces). Plates with ultra-low-attachment surfaces and round-bottomed wells are the other common format, and both are used for high-throughput drug screening.\n\nSpheroids sit between flat cell culture and organoids: they are made from cell lines or primary cells rather than stem-cell-derived tissue, and are cheaper and more uniform, but they do not reproduce the architecture of the tumour they came from.","status":"established","asOf":"2026-11-03","links":[{"label":"Sutherland, McCredie and Inch 1971, Journal of the National Cancer Institute: growth of multicell spheroids in tissue culture as a model of nodular carcinomas","url":"https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/5101993/"},{"label":"Kelm et al. 2003, Biotechnology and Bioengineering: hanging-drop generation of homogeneous multicellular tumour spheroids","url":"https://doi.org/10.1002/bit.10655"}],"tags":[],"related":[],"cancers":[],"sections":["drug-discovery"],"technologies":["organoids","cancer-cell-line-encyclopedias","tumour-on-chip"],"targets":[],"drugs":[],"companies":["insphero"],"institutions":[],"pathways":[],"terms":["organoid"],"trials":[],"people":[],"bottlenecks":[],"keyPapers":[],"journals":[],"dependsOn":[],"notes":[],"principle":"Cells kept from adhering to a surface aggregate into a three-dimensional sphere whose size sets diffusion gradients of oxygen, nutrients and drugs, giving proliferating, quiescent and necrotic zones.","strengths":["Reproduce diffusion gradients and a hypoxic core","Uniform, cheap and suited to screening plates","Better predictor of drug penetration than flat culture"],"limitations":["Usually lack immune cells, stroma and vessels unless added","Cell-line spheroids do not reproduce tumour architecture","Size variation changes drug response"],"since":1971},"route":"/technologies/tumour-spheroid-models/","neighbours":{"section":[{"id":"drug-discovery","kind":"section","name":"Drug Discovery Platforms","route":"/fronts/drug-discovery/"}],"technology":[{"id":"cancer-cell-line-encyclopedias","kind":"technology","name":"Cancer cell line encyclopedias and dependency maps","route":"/technologies/cancer-cell-line-encyclopedias/"},{"id":"organoids","kind":"technology","name":"Patient-derived organoids","route":"/technologies/organoids/"},{"id":"tumour-on-chip","kind":"technology","name":"Tumour-on-a-chip","route":"/technologies/tumour-on-chip/"}],"company":[{"id":"insphero","kind":"company","name":"InSphero","route":"/companies/insphero/"}],"term":[{"id":"organoid","kind":"term","name":"Organoid","route":"/terms/organoid/"}]}}