| |
2D cell cultures |
3D cell cultures |
Animals |
| Tissue Architecture |
Cells are unnaturally polarized and mainly exposed to culture medium and rigid substrates |
Cells interact with ECM and adjacent cells in 3D. They secrete and remodel ECM |
Integrated response from interactions among all tissues and organs |
| Gene expression pattern |
Physiological tumor properties are constricted in 2D and, thus, expression patterns |
Key expression pattern in tumor biology is recreated (apoptosis resistance, etc.) |
Human responses are not accurately captured (drug toxicity, metabolization, etc.) |
| Molecular gradients |
Cells are submitted to uniformly rich oxygenation and drug accessibility |
Oxygen and drug delivery is controlled by simple diffusion |
Vascularization regulates oxygen and drug delivery, together with drug clearance |
| Drug discovery applicability |
Inexpensive and simple to apply for high-throughput screening |
More realistic drug response than 2D. Easier to apply than animal models |
Expensive, time-consuming, poor cell-level imaging and ethically controversial |
