Single-cell analysis supports a role for cancer stem cells in brain tumor growth
"Our work strongly supports that cancer stem cells are the main source of growth in these tumors and, as such, should be considered promising targets for treatment," says Mario Suvà, MD, PhD, of the MGH Department of Pathology, co-senior author of the Nature paper. It has become clear that cancer stem cells -- cells within tumors that exhibit stem cell characteristics and can differentiate into other specialized types of cancer cells -- have a role in the progression and treatment resistance of several types of tumors, most prominently blood system tumors like leukemia. Several studies have supported a role for cancer stem cells in the aggressive brain tumors called glioblastoma, but those studies involved inducing human tumors to grow in mice, and as such their relevance to cancer in humans has been questioned. To more accurately reflect the mechanisms driving oligodendrogliomas, the researchers used RNA sequencing to study directly, on a single-cell level, gene expres...