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Languages : en
Pages : 14
Book Description
Cellular markers which identify putative breast epithelial stem cells have been reported. Certain clinical aspects of breast cancer could result from transformed stem cells in the malignant tumor. Breast cancer may therefore originate from neoplastic transformation of normal breast epithelial stem cells. These transformed stem cells exist in the tumor as rare cells with properties that drive aspects of tumorigenesis. This model predicts slower cell cycle progression, greater resistance to DNA damage, increased in vitro invasion, and in vivo tumorigenesis. We tested the hypothesis that transformed stem cells drive multiple aspects of breast tumorigenesis by functionally characterizing their biological properties. The hypothesis was tested by sorting of putative breast cancer stem cell populations followed by cell cycle analysis, in vitro and in vivo proliferation and invasion assays, and sensitivity to chemotherapy and radiation induced DNA damage. Putative cancer stem cells generally exhibited slower cell cycle progression, greater resistance to DNA damage, and increased tumor formation. However, the stem-like properties of these cells varied widely depending on the line from which they were isolated.
