Novel strategies for targeting leukemia stem cells: sounding the death knell for blood cancer.
BACKGROUND
Cancer stem cells (CSCs), also known as tumor-initiating cells (TICs), are characterized by high self-renewal and multi-lineage differentiation capacities. CSCs are thought to play indispensable roles in the initiation, progression and metastasis of many types of cancer. Leukemias are thought to be initiated and maintained by a specific sub-type of CSC, the leukemia stem cell (LSC). An important feature of LSCs is their resistance to standard therapy, which may lead to relapse. Increasing efforts are aimed at developing novel therapeutic strategies that selectively target LSCs, while sparing their normal counterparts and, thus, minimizing adverse treatment-associated side-effects. These LSC targeting therapies aim to eradicate LSCs through affecting mechanisms that control their survival, self-renewal, differentiation, proliferation and cell cycle progression. Some LSC targeting therapies have already been proven successful in pre-clinical studies and they are now being tested in clinical studies, mainly in combination with conventional treatment regimens.


CONCLUSIONS
A growing body of evidence indicates that the selective targeting of LSCs represents a promising approach to improve disease outcome. Beyond doubt, the CSC hypothesis has added a new dimension to the area of anticancer research, thereby paving the way for shaping a new trend in cancer therapy.
Oncology Research Unit, National Medical Center, IMSS, Oncology Hospital, Mexico City, Mexico.
Antonieta
A
Chavez-Gonzalez
Department of Molecular Genetics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Tarbiat Modares University, P.O. Box: 14115-154, Tehran, Iran.
Babak
B
Bakhshinejad
Department of Molecular Genetics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Tarbiat Modares University, P.O. Box: 14115-154, Tehran, Iran.
Katayoon
K
Pakravan
Department of Medicine, Weill Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Ave, Box 113, New York, NY, 10065, USA. mlg2007@med.cornell.edu.
Monica L
ML
Guzman
Department of Molecular Genetics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Tarbiat Modares University, P.O. Box: 14115-154, Tehran, Iran. sadegh.babashah@gmail.com.
Sadegh
S
Babashah
D000818:Animals; D006801:Humans; D007938:Leukemia / Q000473:pathology*; D014411:Neoplastic Stem Cells / Q000473:pathology*
Blood cancer; Cancer stem cells; Leukemia stem cells; Self renewal; Targeted therapy; Tumor relapse
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