Emerging evidence shows that endothelial cells are not only the building blocks of vascular networks that enable oxygen and nutrient delivery throughout a tissue but also serve as a rich resource of angiocrine factors. Endothelial cells play key roles in determining cancer progression and response to anti-cancer drugs. Furthermore, the endothelium-specific deposition of extracellular matrix is a key modulator of the availability of angiocrine factors to both stromal and cancer cells. Considering tumor vascular network as a decisive factor in cancer pathogenesis and treatment response, these networks need to be an inseparable component of cancer models. Both computational and in vitro experimental models have been extensively developed to model tumor-endothelium interactions. While informative, they have been developed in different communities and do not yet represent a comprehensive platform. In this review, we overview the necessity of incorporating vascular networks for both in vitro and in silico cancer models and discuss recent progresses and challenges of in vitro experimental microfluidic cancer vasculature-on-chip systems and their in silico counterparts. We further highlight how these two approaches can merge together with the aim of presenting a predictive combinatorial platform for studying cancer pathogenesis and testing the efficacy of single or multi-drug therapeutics for cancer treatment.

越来越多的证据表明，内皮细胞不仅是血管网络的组成部分，可以使氧气和营养素在整个组织中传递，而且还可以作为血管分泌因子的丰富资源。内皮细胞在确定癌症进展和对抗癌药物的反应中起关键作用。此外，内皮细胞特异的细胞外基质沉积是基质细胞和癌细胞血管分泌因子利用率的关键调节剂。考虑到肿瘤血管网络是癌症发病机理和治疗反应的决定性因素，这些网络需要成为癌症模型不可分割的组成部分。计算和体外已经广泛开发了实验模型来模拟肿瘤-内皮相互作用。尽管内容翔实，但它们已在不同社区中开发，尚未代表一个全面的平台。在这篇综述中，我们概述了在体外和计算机模拟癌症模型中纳入血管网络的必要性，并讨论了体外实验性微流控癌芯片系统及其在计算机模拟中的最新进展和面临的挑战。我们进一步强调这两种方法如何融合在一起，以期提供一个预测性组合平台以研究癌症发病机理并测试单一或多种药物治疗癌症的功效。