Brain cancer cells can turn into blood vessel cells that feed the tumor, scientists in the US and Italy have determined independently. The results of both studies are published in the latest issue of the journal Nature.
Researchers hope that their discovery will enable the development of new, effective anti-cancer drugs.
Gliomas are a group of malignant tumors in the brain that are fed by a well-developed network of blood vessels. Two groups of scientists – Viviane Tabar of the Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York and Ruggero De Maria of the Istituto Superiore di Sanita in Rome – have shown that most of the cancer’s blood vessel epithelial cells come from the tumor’s own population of cells.
The epithelial cells of glioblastoma blood vessels have the same changes in genetic material as are seen in cancer cells, and the researchers believe are derived from a type of glioblastoma stem cell.
The authors of the study explain that cancer stem cells can support cancer growth in two ways – directly (turning into tumor-forming cells) and indirectly differentiating into cancer cells, and then into blood vessel cells that nourish the remaining cancer cells.
According to the researchers, the treatment of glioblastoma should include a strategy of blocking the differentiation of glioblastoma stem cells into blood vessel epithelial cells, which will prevent cancer nutrition and development. (PAP)