Methods for creating a model of uveal melanoma
Uveal melanoma is a big challenge for medicine, because despite successful local treatment, metastatic disease develops frequently and this is an important factor affecting patient survival. Revealing mechanisms of pathogenesis of this disease and developing targeted therapy requires high-quality animal models that reproduce many aspects of tumor biology, mimic its metastasis dissemination and, most importantly, can be the basis for understanding the principles of diagnosis and treatment. Methods for creating a model of uveal melanoma include injecting syngeneic skin melanoma cells to the experimental animals, injecting xenogenic uveal and skin melanoma cells that can be of both human and animal origin, as well as transplanting xenografts obtained from patients and creating transgenic and induced tumor models. In this review, we analyzed the data of the last 30 years on the methods of modeling uveal melanoma, described the advantages, disadvantages and features that must be considered.