Cancer Cell Line Behaves As Stem Cells

An international team of U.S.-led scientists has determined a breast cancer cell line established a long time ago behaves much as do cancer stem cells.

The researchers led by Nobel Laureate Dr. Renato Dulbecco, president emeritus of the Salk Institute, found a single cell taken from cultured LA7 cells and injected into mouse breast tissue can seed a new mammary carcinoma.

The finding supports the observation that although cancer stem cells are rare, a single cancer stem cell is sufficient to initiate and maintain a malignant tumor.

We can use single cancer stem cells to study the dynamics and behavior of cancer stem cells and their role in solid tumor formation at the single cell level, said lead author Ileana Zucchi, a molecular cancer biologist at the Institute for Biological Technology in Milan, Italy.

As we learn more about tumor formation at the single cell level in tissue, we may be able to specifically target cancer stem cells for destruction while leaving the normal stem cells in the body intact, said Zucchi.

The study appears in the online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.