Maloney Research Laboratory

Osteosarcoma is the most common primary tumor of the bone and disproportionately impacts children and adolescents. Although surgery to remove the primary tumor is a mainstay of treatment for osteosarcoma, surgical procedures on cancer patients have long been suggested to trigger the progression of metastatic disease. My lab focuses on understanding the individual impacts of primary tumor removal and surgical stress on the metastatic microenvironment of the lung and how these triggers may impact the local immune cells to support or suppress metastatic tumor growth. We utilize a mouse model of osteosarcoma where we investigate the effect of primary tumor-bearing hindlimb amputation on lung metastasis. We compare this to mice who have their tumor left in place and mice who undergo amputation of the contralateral limb. We investigate the impact on the lung immune microenvironment using flow cytometric analysis, immunohistochemistry and single cell transcriptomic techniques. Our goal is to understand the mechanisms behind surgery-accelerated metastasis to develop perioperative therapies to block this effect and potentially improve survival.