Drug resistance detection of endometrial cancer cell lines using digital holographic microscopy

Endometrial cancer is one of the most common gynecological malignancies. In endometrial cancer treatment, drug resistance test plays the vital role since different patients have different reactions to chemotherapy. Traditional methods of drug resistance test usually take a few days to obtain results, which will be quite a long time for patients waiting for cancer treatment. In this research, in order to quickly quantify the drug resistance of cancer cells, we managed to find some relationships between the dynamic changing processes and drug resistance of endometrial cancer cells. To accurately obtain and quantitatively analyze the dynamic processes, we utilized digital holographic microscopy (DHM) to retrieve phase maps of living cancer cells. Based on the real-time reconstructed phase maps, we reestablished the dynamic process of both the cisplatin-resistant cell (Ishikawa, ISK) and non-cisplatin-resistant cell (Ishikawa/CisR, ISKC). ISK and ISK-C were separately treated with cisplatin (0ug/ml, control; 5ug/ml, low concentration, LC; and 100ug/ml, high concentration, HC), and holograms of cells in each group were recorded by a DHM setup for 30min before and 150min after cisplatin treatment with a frame rate of one record every five second. Several morphological parameters, including cell height, cell projected area, and cell volume, were calculated from the retrieved phase maps and membrane fluctuations were analyzed both in temporal and spatial domains. Statistically significant differences in the changing processes were found between the two kinds of cells.