[1] Syngeneic and xenograft experimental tumors across multiple animal species were treated with injected or intravenous C. novyi-NT spores, including colon and pancreatic cancers in mice, aggressive squamous cell carcinoma in rabbits, and glioblastomas in rats.

Bacteriolysis in hypoxic tumor parts can be combined with chemotherapy and/or radiation that are more effective in proliferating, non-hypoxic areas at the cost of increased toxicity.

[citation needed] Normal cells are generally not hypoxic, preventing these bacteria from penetrating such tumors.

[1] In 2014, researchers found that a modified strain of Clostridium novyi bacteria caused tumor shrinkage without damaging normal cells.

When the bacteria reached the edge of the tumor, they stopped killing cells around them due to the oxygen present in the environment of normal body tissue.