Experimental animal models of pancreatic cancer (review).

Pancreatic adenocarcinoma is currently the fifth leading cause of cancer-related death in the United States and is largely refractory to conventional therapies. The average survival from diagnosis to death is 4-6 months. The major cause of death is rapid development of metastasis involving the lymph nodes, liver, lungs, or peritoneum. To understand its etiology and eventually to make prevention possible and effective, appropriate carcinogenesis models will certainly help shed more light on the process of pancreatic carcinogenesis and help us understand the effects of environmental and genetic elements on pancreatic cancer development. The development of new treatment strategies to control cancer metastasis is of immediate urgency. Fulfillment of this difficult task relies on our knowledge of the cellular and molecular biology of pancreatic cancer metastasis, and the use of relevant animal models will certainly help define each aspect of this complicated process.