Cell & Developmental Biology
Open Access

Tumorigenicity

Tumorigenicity is defined as the ability of cultured cells to give rise to either benign or malignant progressively growing tumours showing viable and mitotically active cells in immunologically nonresponsive animals over a limited observation period. The ability of a cell line to produce tumour in an animal is highly dependent on and defined by the assay in which it is tested. A variety of animal systems are suitable for in vivo tumorigenesis studies.