Teresa Judith Ziegler

Ms. Teresa Judith Ziegler

Research Institute for Women’s Health, University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Baden-Württemberg, Germany
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Research Focus & Metrics

Academic Career Length

4Years (2023-Present)

(Calculated once Scilit publication data is synced: current year − year of first publication + 1)

Representative Publications

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13 July 2023 in Cancers
Verified
Journal Article
Open access
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CÖCansu Ebru Önder
Cansu Ebru Önder
TZTeresa Judith Ziegler
Teresa Judith Ziegler
RBRonja Becker
Ronja Becker
SBSara Yvonne Brucker
Sara Yvonne Brucker
AHAndreas Hartkopf
Andreas Hartkopf
AKAndré Koch
André Koch
The poor outcome of metastasized breast cancer (BC) stresses the need for reliable personalized oncology and the significance of models recapitulating the heterogeneous nature of BC. Here, we cultured metastatic tumor cells derived from advanced BC patients with malignant ascites (MA) or malignant pleural effusion (MPE) using organoid technology. We identified the characteristics of tumor organoids by applying immunohistochemistry and mutation analysis. Tumor organoids preserved their expression patterns and hotspot mutations when compared to their original metastatic counterpart and are consequently a well-suited in vitro model for metastasized BC. We treated the tumor organoids to implement a reliable application for drug screenings of metastasized cells. Drug assays revealed that responses are not always in accord with expression patterns, pathway activation, and hotspot mutations. The discrepancy between characterization and functional testing underlines the relevance of linking IHC stainings and mutational analysis of metastasized BC with in vitro drug assays. Our metastatic BC organoids recapitulate the characteristics of their original sample derived from MA and MPE and serve as an invaluable tool that can be utilized in a preclinical setting for guiding therapy decisions.