Comparison of volumetric dynamic optical coherence tomography with biological methods for evaluation of radiation effects in prostate tumor spheroids

Significance

Three-dimensional (3D) tumor spheroids are more physiologically representative of in vivo patient tumors compared with two-dimensional monolayer culture. However, their 3D nature challenges the use of conventional biological techniques such as proliferation assays, fluorescence microscopy, and the clonogenic assay, which is the gold standard method for assessing cell survival following radiation. However, the clonogenic assay requires spheroid disaggregation.