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Figure 3. Monitoring of therapeutic responses to capecitabine and/or photodynamic therapy (PDT) in murine breast tumor model using an in vivo imaging system (IVIS). 4T1 murine breast cancer cells (stably transfected with luciferase) were implanted in the breast fat pad of nude mice and monitored for bioluminescence signals originating from tumors, using an IVIS instrument. (A) Tumor growth or shrinkage after 1 or 2 weeks of vehicle- or capecitabine (CPBN)-only, ALA + PDT or CPBN + PDT, was monitored by injection of luciferin, and measurement and quantitation of luminescence output using Live imaging software as described^[25]. A typical radiance scale, common to most of the bioluminescent images, is shown in (A); (B) quantitation of bioluminescent light units, relative to pre-PDT tumor luminescence from each treatment group, is shown as fold increase. Bars representing mean (-/+ SEM), from the number of mice shown in parentheses on top of the bars (pooled from four independent experiments) are shown. The differences observed in the relative bioluminescence between vehicle + PDT and CPBN + PDT at one (P = 0.14) and two (P = 0.20) weeks post PDT, were not statistically significant