Figure 5.

In vivo simulations of anti-Bcl-2 therapy applied to a tumor at early and late stages of development. Our model is based on experiments described in [11, 12, 13], wherein HDMECs along with oral squamous carcinoma cells are transplanted into SCID mice, on ploy-L lactic acid matrices. The HDMECs are observed to differentiate into functional microvessels, giving rise to a vascularized tumor. A,B, BL193 is administered in starting from the day of implantation and continuing thereafter. As therapy levels increase from 0 to 0.05 µM, and to 0.5 µM, time taken to reach maximal tumor cell density increases by 25% and 89% respectively (A). The corresponding increase in time taken to reach maximal vessel density is 37% and 121% respectively (B). 5 µM of BL193 appears to be enough to effect a cure. C,D, BL193 is administered to a fully developed tumor, starting from day 60 of implantation and continuing thereafter. 5 µM of BL193 is insufficient to effect a cure, and only a temporary reduction in tumor cell (C), and vessel densities (D) is observed. The minimum amount of therapy required in order to cause tumor regression is predicted to be 27.26 mM.