Brain cancer stem cells are found to be highly resistant to chemotherapy and other treatments

Newswise: While great interest has followed the discovery of neural stem cells and their potential for someday treating diseases and injuries of the brain and spinal cord, recent research identified “cancer stem cells,” a small population of cells that appear to be the source of cells comprising a malignant brain tumor. Theoretically, if these mother cells can be destroyed, the tumor will not be able to sustain itself. On the other hand, if these cells are not removed or destroyed, the tumor will continue to return despite the use of current cancer-killing therapies.

Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center’s Maxine Dunitz Neurosurgical Institute, who first isolated cancer stem cells in adult brain tumors in 2004, have now found these cells to be highly resistant to chemotherapy and other treatments. Even if a tumor is almost completely obliterated, it will regenerate from the surviving cancer stem cells and be even more resistant to treatment than before.

Results of studies on three established glioma cell lines and tumor tissue removed from five patients at Cedars-Sinai appear in the Dec. 2 issue of the journal Molecular Cancer. The researchers describe genes and mechanisms that give cancer stem cells their chemoresistant properties. They also allude to ongoing research aimed at developing methods for readily distinguishing cancer stem cells from normal neural stem cells, which could lead to therapies targeting the cancer-causing cells without damaging healthy ones.

“If one believes in the cancer stem cell hypothesis, this is an extremely important area of investigation. These stem cells are like the mother cells of the tumor, which I think is a very significant observation. It may guide the way we research tumors and the way we look for therapeutic approaches to treat these tumors because all of our efforts will need to be directed at killing these cells,” said Keith L. Black, M.D., neurosurgeon, director of the Maxine Dunitz Neurosurgical Institute and chair of Cedars-Sinai’s Department of Neurosurgery.

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