Advances in Cancer Stem Cell Biology
Advances in Cancer Stem Cell Biology informs the reader about both basic and potential clinical applications of an intriguing subpopulation of cancer cells -defined in different way as cancer stem cells, cancer stem like cells, tumor maintaining cells and
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Roberto Scatena Bruno Giardina
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Alvaro Mordente
Editors
Advances in Cancer Stem Cell Biology
Editors Roberto Scatena Department of Laboratory Medicine Catholic University 00168 Rome, Italy [email protected] Bruno Giardina Department of Laboratory Medicine Catholic University 00168 Rome, Italy [email protected]
Alvaro Mordente Institute of Biochemistry and Clinical Biochemistry Catholic University School of Medicine 00168 Rome, Italy [email protected]
ISBN 978-1-4614-0808-6 e-ISBN 978-1-4614-0809-3 DOI 10.1007/978-1-4614-0809-3 Springer New York Dordrecht Heidelberg London Library of Congress Control Number: 2011935366 © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2012 All rights reserved. This work may not be translated or copied in whole or in part without the written permission of the publisher (Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, 233 Spring Street, New York, NY 10013, USA), except for brief excerpts in connection with reviews or scholarly analysis. Use in connection with any form of information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed is forbidden. The use in this publication of trade names, trademarks, service marks, and similar terms, even if they are not identified as such, is not to be taken as an expression of opinion as to whether or not they are subject to proprietary rights. Printed on acid-free paper Springer is part of Springer Science+Business Media (www.springer.com)
Preface
The classic hallmarks of cancer are a poorly differentiated phenotype, and a cellular and genetic heterogeneity. In the past, the cellular diversity of cancer has mostly been attributed to the genetic instability of its cells. As the tumor cell population expands, individual cells pick up random mutations, and their molecular identity starts to diverge. By the time the cancer is detected, the millions of cells that make up the tumor have become as different from each other. Cancer stem cells (CSCs) or, as defined by other authors, tumor-maintaining cells or cancer stem-like cells are a subpopulation of cancer cells that acquired some of the characteristics of stem cells to survive and adapt to ever-changing environments. These include the ability to self-renew and the capacity to produce progenitors that differentiate into other cell types. It has been originally hypothesized that CSCs could potentially arise from normal stem or early progenitors. Now, the longstanding notion that fully committed and specialized cells might de-differentiate over the course of tumor initiation and progression to originate CSCs has been reevaluated. At present, data emerge to indicate that cancer cells that resemble stem cells need not be part of the original tumor but rather may emerge during later stages of tumor development. The observed tumor heterogeneity is probably a combination of growing genomic instability and epigenetic instability associated with the acquisition of a stem cell-like phenotype. Th
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