The In Ovo Chick Chorioallantoic Membrane (CAM) Assay as an Efficient Xenograft Model of Hepatocellular Carcinoma

The chick chorioallantoic membrane (CAM) begins to develop by day 7 after fertilization and matures by day 12. The CAM is naturally immunodeficient and highly vascularized, making it an ideal system for tumor implantation. Furthermore, the CAM contains extracellular matrix proteins such as fibronectin, laminin, collagen, integrin alpha(v)beta3, and MMP-2, making it an attractive model to study tumor invasion and metastasis. Scientists have long taken advantage of the physiology of the CAM by using it as a model of angiogenesis. More recently, the CAM assay has been modified to work as an in vivo xenograft model system for various cancers that bridges the gap between basic in vitro work and more complex animal cancer models. The CAM assay allows for the study of tumor growth, anti-tumor therapies, and pro-tumor molecular pathways in a biologically relevant system that is both cost- and time-effective. Here, we describe the development of CAM xenograft model of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) with embryonic survival rates of up to 93% and reliable tumor take leading to growth of three-dimensional, vascularized tumors.