title: Colonic and colorectal cancer stem cells: progress in the search for putative biomarkers.
abstract: The maintenance of healthy colonic crypts is dependent on the integrity of the adult epithelial stem cells located within them. Perturbations in stem cell dynamics are generally believed to represent the first step towards colorectal tumorigenesis. Experimental manipulation of intestinal stem cells has greatly increased our understanding of them, but further progress has been slowed due to the absence of a reliable stem cell biomarker. In this review we discuss the candidate colonic stem cell biomarkers which have been proposed. Furthermore, we investigate the putative biomarkers for so-called colorectal cancer stem cells, a highly aggressive subpopulation of cells considered to drive tumour development.
authors.affiliation: School of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, Durham University, Durham, UK. n.d.willis@durham.ac.uk
authors.forename: Naomi D
authors.initials: ND
authors.lastname: Willis
authors.forename: Stefan A
authors.initials: SA
authors.lastname: Przyborski
authors.forename: Christopher J
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: Hutchison
authors.forename: Robert G
authors.initials: RG
authors.lastname: Wilson
mesh_terms: D053687:Adult Stem Cells / Q000166:cytology*; D015415:Biomarkers / Q000032:analysis; D019070:Cell Lineage; D003106:Colon / Q000166:cytology*; D015179:Colorectal Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology*; D006801:Humans; D014411:Neoplastic Stem Cells / Q000473:pathology*
chemical_list: D015415:Biomarkers