Close

Zebrafish as a model to investigate the effects of exercise in cancer

Alexandra Yin, Nathaniel R. Campbell, Lee W. Jones, Richard M. White

Posted on: 12 March 2018

Preprint posted on 9 March 2018

Another string to the bow: Zebrafish can be used to investigate the effect of exercise endurance on melanoma progression

Selected by Jacky G. Goetz

Selected by Jacky G.Goetz (@GoetzJacky) and Gautier Follain (@Follain_Ga, Ph.D student in Jacky’s group)

This preprint from the group of Richard M. White (MSKCC) provides an elegant and original proof of principle for the use of zebrafish (D. rerio) as a relevant model to study the impact of exercise on cancer progression. They first established a flow chamber system, with tunable parameters, that allows to subject embryos and adults to a reproducible paradigm of endurance exercise. They then grafted a previously established zebrafish melanoma cell line and investigated tumor growth in adults and larvae that were forced to exercise in swimming tunnels for two consecutive weeks. Doing so, they show that exercise significantly decreases cancer progression in larvae, but not in adults.

Bigger picture

This proof of principle reveals a new string to the bow of the zebrafish model, which offers a huge number of advantages for studying cancer progression, and beyond. Growing evidence shows that exercise impact cancer progression in patients. Nevertheless, these questions have only been poorly studied so far, and mostly addressed in few studies using rodent models.

This proof of principle study opens multiple doors for interrogating the effect of exercise during cancer progression. The authors nicely described (in the discussion) the multiple options provided by such an assay. For example, one could test:

– 100 to 1000 of animals, which cannot be done with rodents

– CRISPR-mediated tuning of macro/microenvironmental cues

– screen for small molecules, some of which could have therapeutical implications

– transgenic zebrafish lines with full and competent immune systems.

In conclusion, this study, which combines the great advantages of the zebrafish model with a pioneer set-up for interrogating the benefits of exercise during cancer progression, should inspire many studies to come.

Open questions

A few open questions, that should pave the way for future research, remain:

– Is it possible to maintain better survival during experimentation (exercise)?

– Would short intense exercise phenocopy the results obtained with 2weeks endurance?

– What are the effects of regular & intense exercise and metabolic boosters on cancer development?

– Why do embryos/larvae behave differently than adults?

– Do these observations apply to other cancer types?

– Importantly, would exercise prevent metastasis onset and/or progression?

Combining high-throughput imaging of metastasis formation/growth in conditions of exercise would very likely provide useful information as to how we could prevent metastasis formation in a near future.

Figure: Snapshot from Figure 4 : Representative images of tumor-bearing zebrafish larvae, at one or two weeks of the trials. Green color is showing the GFP signal from the transplanted melanoma cells.

Movie : Here, the authors shared a time-lapse imaging of an acute exercise bout in adult zebrafish. Supplemental Movie 1

 

Tags: cancer, exercise, metabolism

Read preprint (No Ratings Yet)

Have your say

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Sign up to customise the site to your preferences and to receive alerts

Register here

Also in the bioengineering category:

3D mechanical confinement directs muscle stem cell fate and function

GaYoung Park, Josh A. Grey, Foteini Mourkioti, et al.

Selected by 30 April 2025

Justin Gutkowski

Bioengineering

Heart Scar-In-A-Dish: Tissue Culture Platform to Study Myocardial Infarct Healing In Vitro

MJ Potter, JD Heywood, SJ Coeyman, et al.

Selected by 28 April 2025

Theodora Stougiannou

Bioengineering

Coagulative Granular Hydrogels with an Enzyme Catalyzed Fibrin Network for Endogenous Tissue Regeneration

Zhipeng Deng, Camila B. Tovani, Simona Bianco, et al.

Selected by 06 January 2025

Castro Johnbosco

Bioengineering

Also in the cancer biology category:

Tumoral CD24 tunes platelet binding and pro-metastatic functions

Vincent Mittelheisser, Cristina Liboni, Clarisse Mouriaux, et al.

Selected by 16 June 2025

Harvey Roweth

Cancer Biology

Swirling motion of breast cancer cells radially aligns collagen fibers to enable collective invasion

Aashrith Saraswathibhatla, Md Foysal Rabbi, Sushama Varma, et al.

Selected by 10 June 2025

Sharvari Pitke

Biophysics

Nucleoplasmic Lamin A/C controls replication fork restart upon stress by modulating local H3K9me3 and ADP-ribosylation levels

Veronica Cherdyntseva, Joanna Paulson, Selin Adakli, et al.

Selected by 05 June 2025

Jenny Singh

Molecular Biology

Also in the physiology category:

Fibroblast growth factor 21 regulates neuromuscular junction innervation through HDAC4 in denervation-induced skeletal muscle atrophy

Lirong Zheng, Takashi Sasaki, Liyang Ni, et al.

Selected by 25 April 2025

Jórdan Sampar

Neuroscience

Hyaluronic Acid and Emergent Tissue Mechanics Orchestrate Digit Tip Regeneration

Byron W.H. Mui, Joseph Y. Wong, Toni Bray, et al.

Selected by 20 March 2025

Jonathan Townson

Developmental Biology

Scaly-Tail Organ Enhances Static Stability during Pel’s Scaly-tailed Flying Squirrels’ Arboreal Locomotion

Andrew K. Schulz, Mrudul Chellapurath, Pranav C. Khandelwal, et al.

Selected by 28 February 2025

EMB EMB_Liv et al.

Evolutionary Biology

Also in the cancer biology category:

May in preprints – the CellBio edition

A group of preLighters, with expertise in different areas of cell biology, have worked together to create this preprint reading lists for researchers with an interest in cell biology. This month, categories include: 1) Biochemistry/metabolism 2) Cancer cell Biology 3) Cell adhesion, migration and cytoskeleton 4) Cell organelles and organisation 5) Cell signalling and 6) Genetics

 



List by Barbora Knotkova et al.

Keystone Symposium – Metabolic and Nutritional Control of Development and Cell Fate

This preList contains preprints discussed during the Metabolic and Nutritional Control of Development and Cell Fate Keystone Symposia. This conference was organized by Lydia Finley and Ralph J. DeBerardinis and held in the Wylie Center and Tupper Manor at Endicott College, Beverly, MA, United States from May 7th to 9th 2025. This meeting marked the first in-person gathering of leading researchers exploring how metabolism influences development, including processes like cell fate, tissue patterning, and organ function, through nutrient availability and metabolic regulation. By integrating modern metabolic tools with genetic and epidemiological insights across model organisms, this event highlighted key mechanisms and identified open questions to advance the emerging field of developmental metabolism.

 



List by Virginia Savy, Martin Estermann

April in preprints – the CellBio edition

A group of preLighters, with expertise in different areas of cell biology, have worked together to create this preprint reading lists for researchers with an interest in cell biology. This month, categories include: 1) biochemistry/metabolism 2) cell cycle and division 3) cell organelles and organisation 4) cell signalling and mechanosensing 5) (epi)genetics

 



List by Vibha SINGH et al.

March in preprints – the CellBio edition

A group of preLighters, with expertise in different areas of cell biology, have worked together to create this preprint reading lists for researchers with an interest in cell biology. This month, categories include: 1) cancer biology 2) cell migration 3) cell organelles and organisation 4) cell signalling and mechanosensing 5) genetics and genomics 6) other

 



List by Girish Kale et al.

Biologists @ 100 conference preList

This preList aims to capture all preprints being discussed at the Biologists @100 conference in Liverpool, UK, either as part of the poster sessions or the (flash/short/full-length) talks.

 



List by Reinier Prosee, Jonathan Townson

February in preprints – the CellBio edition

A group of preLighters, with expertise in different areas of cell biology, have worked together to create this preprint reading lists for researchers with an interest in cell biology. This month, categories include: 1) biochemistry and cell metabolism 2) cell organelles and organisation 3) cell signalling, migration and mechanosensing

 



List by Barbora Knotkova et al.

BSCB-Biochemical Society 2024 Cell Migration meeting

This preList features preprints that were discussed and presented during the BSCB-Biochemical Society 2024 Cell Migration meeting in Birmingham, UK in April 2024. Kindly put together by Sara Morais da Silva, Reviews Editor at Journal of Cell Science.

 



List by Reinier Prosee

CSHL 87th Symposium: Stem Cells

Preprints mentioned by speakers at the #CSHLsymp23

 



List by Alex Eve

Journal of Cell Science meeting ‘Imaging Cell Dynamics’

This preList highlights the preprints discussed at the JCS meeting 'Imaging Cell Dynamics'. The meeting was held from 14 - 17 May 2023 in Lisbon, Portugal and was organised by Erika Holzbaur, Jennifer Lippincott-Schwartz, Rob Parton and Michael Way.

 



List by Helen Zenner

CellBio 2022 – An ASCB/EMBO Meeting

This preLists features preprints that were discussed and presented during the CellBio 2022 meeting in Washington, DC in December 2022.

 



List by Nadja Hümpfer et al.

Fibroblasts

The advances in fibroblast biology preList explores the recent discoveries and preprints of the fibroblast world. Get ready to immerse yourself with this list created for fibroblasts aficionados and lovers, and beyond. Here, my goal is to include preprints of fibroblast biology, heterogeneity, fate, extracellular matrix, behavior, topography, single-cell atlases, spatial transcriptomics, and their matrix!

 



List by Osvaldo Contreras

Single Cell Biology 2020

A list of preprints mentioned at the Wellcome Genome Campus Single Cell Biology 2020 meeting.

 



List by Alex Eve

ASCB EMBO Annual Meeting 2019

A collection of preprints presented at the 2019 ASCB EMBO Meeting in Washington, DC (December 7-11)

 



List by Madhuja Samaddar et al.

Lung Disease and Regeneration

This preprint list compiles highlights from the field of lung biology.

 



List by Rob Hynds

Anticancer agents: Discovery and clinical use

Preprints that describe the discovery of anticancer agents and their clinical use. Includes both small molecules and macromolecules like biologics.

 



List by Zhang-He Goh

Biophysical Society Annual Meeting 2019

Few of the preprints that were discussed in the recent BPS annual meeting at Baltimore, USA

 



List by Joseph Jose Thottacherry

Also in the physiology category:

Biologists @ 100 conference preList

This preList aims to capture all preprints being discussed at the Biologists @100 conference in Liverpool, UK, either as part of the poster sessions or the (flash/short/full-length) talks.

 



List by Reinier Prosee, Jonathan Townson

Fibroblasts

The advances in fibroblast biology preList explores the recent discoveries and preprints of the fibroblast world. Get ready to immerse yourself with this list created for fibroblasts aficionados and lovers, and beyond. Here, my goal is to include preprints of fibroblast biology, heterogeneity, fate, extracellular matrix, behavior, topography, single-cell atlases, spatial transcriptomics, and their matrix!

 



List by Osvaldo Contreras

FENS 2020

A collection of preprints presented during the virtual meeting of the Federation of European Neuroscience Societies (FENS) in 2020

 



List by Ana Dorrego-Rivas

TAGC 2020

Preprints recently presented at the virtual Allied Genetics Conference, April 22-26, 2020. #TAGC20

 



List by Maiko Kitaoka et al.

Autophagy

Preprints on autophagy and lysosomal degradation and its role in neurodegeneration and disease. Includes molecular mechanisms, upstream signalling and regulation as well as studies on pharmaceutical interventions to upregulate the process.

 



List by Sandra Malmgren Hill

Cellular metabolism

A curated list of preprints related to cellular metabolism at Biorxiv by Pablo Ranea Robles from the Prelights community. Special interest on lipid metabolism, peroxisomes and mitochondria.

 



List by Pablo Ranea Robles