Maya Kazemi

Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a form of cancer that originates in the bone marrow and is caused by mutations in specific blood cells. AML cells in the bone marrow are surrounded by other components, which creates a microenvironment around them that can assist the AML cells in evading treatment. Therefore, it is crucial that the methods for testing treatments take into account the interactions between AML cells and their microenvironment. Currently, such testing methods include mice and 2D models. The problem is that these models can’t accurately represent what could occur in human patients, as mice are a different species with a different microenvironment, and interactions in the bone marrow occur in 3D rather than in 2D. 

Therefore, the goal of my project is to evaluate how different types of AML would respond to treatments, while using a model that takes into account how the bone marrow microenvironment could affect their response to treatment.  My project will use 3D spheroid models that I will create with bone marrow cells and two groups of AML cell lines, previously modified to have different colonization capacities to simulate more and less aggressive types of AML, meaning it is expected that the two spheroids will be populated with different amounts of AML cells. I then plan to treat the spheroids with the same drug and evaluate the differences in their responses to treatment. 

The 3D spheroid model made with bone marrow cells can more accurately replicate the interactions that would occur within the bone marrow microenvironment of a patient, and the different AML cell lines can represent the different characteristics of AML that can be found in a variety of patients. Understanding how different forms of AML respond to treatments, while taking into account their relationship with their microenvironment, is helpful in better understanding how treatments may translate to human patients.