Gastric Rings

Developing in the stomach, gastric cancer (GC) is the third deadliest cancer type worldwide. Treatment is complicated by the variability of the disease, classified into different types based on the phenotype of the tumours, their appearance and behaviour, and on their genotype, the genetic abnormalities linked to the disease. To explore this diversity in more detail, researchers used cells from GC patients to generate a suite of gastric organoids, aggregations of cells replicating the properties of stomach tissue, allowing them to study the many forms of GC in the laboratory. Microscopy reveals considerable variation in the structure of these organoids (pictured); for each one, cell nuclei are shown in blue, cytoskeleton actin fibres in green, and integrin, an attachment molecule, in red. Matching the genetic origins of GC tumours in these organoids to their morphology and their response to treatments should help us understand how to tackle this multi-faceted cancer.

Written by Emmanuelle Briolat

Emmanuelle Briolat

Writer

A researcher specialising in visual signals in Lepidoptera, camouflage and the effects of light pollution, Emmanuelle’s writing covers a range of topics, from biomedical research to children’s books about moth defences.

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• Image from work by Kosaku Nanki, Kohta Toshimitsu and Ai Takano, and colleagues
• Department of Gastroenterology, Keio University School of Medicine, Tokyo, Japan
• Image copyright Elsevier 2018. Reproduced with permission.
• Published in Cell, August 2018