Scots experts hail boost to research into male cancer

Published on Tuesday 3 August 2010 18:28

SCOTTISH scientists have made a breakthrough in the search for the causes of testicular cancer in young men.

The team from the University of Edinburgh were able to grow human testicular tissue in mice, allowing them to focus in on the changes that occur before birth which may lead to cancer in later life.

They will now use the method to test what factors, such as environmental chemicals and obesity in pregnant women, might influence changes in the cells.

Testicular germ cell cancer (TGCC) is the most common cancer among men aged 15 to 44, and cases are increasing.

However, testicular cancer is still relatively rare, with about 2,000 cases in the UK each year among all age groups.

Experts already know that testicular cancer originates from the abnormal development of germ cells - cells that go on to become sex cells - in foetuses.

However, how and why this happens has been impossible to explore before now.

In the latest study, published in the journal Human Reproduction, experts developed a new method to investigate how human testicles develop in baby boys before they are born. They got ethical approve to take testicular tissue from aborted foetuses and graft it into mice, watching how the cells developed normally, as if inside a womb, over a six-week period.

Previous studies have not been possible, because the TGCC seen in men does not occur in laboratory animals.

Testicular tissue also cannot be studied in a test-tube because it does not survive and develop normally.

But, using the new model, experts should be able to determine which factors interfere with normal germ cell development and allow cancer to develop.

The team also hopes the mouse model could be used to investigate other health issues, including sexual disorders.

Professor Richard Sharpe, the principal investigator at the Medical Research Council (MRC) Human Reproductive Sciences Unit in Edinburgh, said: "This vital work will take research into testicular cancer to a new level.

"We now have a viable system that enables us to test what factors might interfere with development. It will help us to investigate, for example, whether common environmental chemicals, that foetuses are exposed to in the womb, play a role in the development of testicular cancer - an aspect that simply could not have been studied before."

Prof Sharpe said there was now "overwhelming" evidence that growth and development in the womb played a fundamental role in determining likelihood of disease in later life.