title: Ultrastructural studies of glioma stem cells/progenitor cells.
abstract: Although the ultrastructural features of several brain tumor cells have been studied in details, the ultrastructure of glioma stem cells/progenitors cells (GSPC) has rarely been reported. In this paper, the authors describe the ultrastructural features of GSPCs isolated from both a glioma tissue and the human glioma cell SHG-44 cell line. The ultrastructural features of the two kinds of GSPCs were similar, with relatively developed mitochondria, Golgi apparatuses, ribosomes, undeveloped rough endoplasmic reticula, seldom lysosomes and no typical autophagosomes, and high nuclear-cytoplasmic ratio. Their nuclei, frequently containing huge amounts of euchromatin and a small quantity of heterochromatin, were mostly globular; and the majority of the nuclei had only one nucleole. Typical apoptotic cells could hardly be found in tumor spheres, and between adjacent cells there were cell junctions, which probably were incompletely developed desmosomes or intermediate junctions. In conclusion, their ultrastructural features showed that GSPCs were at the primary stage of differentiation, and could even partially reveal the underlying reasons for the malignant proliferation and differential inhibition of GSPCs.
authors.affiliation: Department of Cerebral Surgery, The 2nd Afiliated Hospital, The Laboratory of Aging and Neuro-disease, Suzhou University, Jiangsu, Peoples Republic of China.
authors.forename: Yaodong
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.forename: Qiang
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.forename: Tianyi
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Jun
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Dong
authors.forename: Aidong
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Qing
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Lan
authors.forename: Xiaosong
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Gu
authors.forename: Zhenghong
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Qin
mesh_terms: D001932:Brain Neoplasms / Q000648:ultrastructure*; D045744:Cell Line, Tumor; D005260:Female; D005910:Glioma / Q000648:ultrastructure*; D006801:Humans; D046529:Microscopy, Electron, Transmission; D008875:Middle Aged; D014411:Neoplastic Stem Cells / Q000648:ultrastructure*