VCaP

The VCaP (vertebral cancer of the prostate) cell line was established in 1997 from a metastatic prostate tumor that developed in the vertebrae of a 59-year-old Caucasian patient with the hormone-refractory disease who had failed androgen deprivation therapy [97]. VCaP was passaged as xenografts in nude mice and then cultured in vitro. The VCaP cells exhibit multiple features of clinical PCa, including expression of PSA, PAP, and AR. One study has also shown the elevated expression of the AR-V7 variant in VCaP xenograft after castration by next-generation RNA-Seq [126]. Additionally, these cells express CK-8, CK-18, Rb, and p53 (with A248W mutation). As per the American Type Culture Collection, the doubling time of this cell line was about 51 h (VCaP ATCC CRL-2876TM). These cells form tumors when injected subcutaneously in SCID mice [97,127]. The presence of the *TMPRSS2:ERG* fusion gene has been shown to stimulate the growth of the VCaP orthotopic mouse model [128].
