Our AVI-PDX ™and AVI-cell-DX™ models

OncoFactory operates a unique technological platform exploiting an innovative patient-derived xenograft (PDX) animal model, the avian embryo. Miniature replicas of tumors from patient samples (AVI-PDX™)  or from cell lines (AVI-cell-DX™) are created in a series of embryos, which can receive therapeutic treatments. Our technology allows modeling the heterogeneity of patient tumors, statistical analysis of treatment efficacies, and a range of molecular analyses for biomarker and therapeutic target discovery. The AVI-PDX model of Oncofactory holds the unique advantage of allowing the creation of tumors and the delivery of therapeutic compounds in only a few days. Moreover, the tumorigenesis is targeted onto tissues which are homologous to those in which primary tumors emerge in the patient or in known sites of metastasis. Tumor replicas are imaged in 3D in the entire organism by using high resolution confocal microscopy. A range of molecular analyses can also be conducted on tumor replicas, host tissues and fluids.

 This technology is protected by 2 patents :

1.EP 3 167 048 B1

2.WO 2017/103025

What can we do with the OncoFactory technology?

• create a vast range of PDX models from patient samples; including for cancers that failed to develop in classical patient-derived xenograft  mice
• model the heterogeneity of patient tumors for validation of targeted therapies
• identify responsive patients and search for markers distinguishing them among the population of patients.

How and why does our model work?

Classically, patient-derived xenografts (PDX) are achieved under the skin of adult immune-deprived mice and take weeks to months to give rise to tumors. The dermis environment strongly differs from that of tissues in which tumors form in the patients and is poor in signals important for tumors to develop. In contrast, the embryonal tissues are rich in signals, different from one tissue to the other one, which ensure their building. The same signals will mediate tissue renewal at adulthood. Thus, tumoral cells can recognize these signals in the embryo and exploit them to proliferate and disseminate. By selecting the tissue in which tumors will form, we confront tumoral cells to an environment which evokes that of their site of origin in the patient. This makes it our model powerful to generate tumors in an optimal range of time. Delloye-Bourgeois et al., Cancer Cell, 2017