Malignant Melanoma also called „black skin cancer" is the most aggressive and deadliest form of skin cancer with an increasing incidence worldwide. In particular patients with metastatic melanoma are generally considered incurable since advanced stages of melanoma are highly resistant to radio- and chemotherapy. Therefore, there is the great effort in ongoing melanoma research to find new and specific treatment options for this disease. In this regard the death ligand TRAIL has gained considerable interest and relevance as a potential anticancer agent, given its ability to induce apoptosis in transformed cells without doing harm to normal, healthy cells. However treatment with this tumor-selective death ligand is confined by the fact that many melanoma cell lines and primary melanoma are resistant against TRAIL-induced apoptosis. In the context of this work it could be shown for the first time that TRAIL-resistant melanoma cells could be highly sensitised to TRAIL-induced apoptosis not only in 2D-cell culture but also under in vivo like conditions, namely in tumor spheroids and organotypic skin models by stimulating the melanoma cells with TRAIL in combination with UVB or cisplatin.
د محمد محمود محمد عبد الفتاح | DR MOHAMMAD MAHMOUD MOHAMMAD ADEL FATAH | 9962