| ISOLATION,
CULTURE AND MOLECULAR CHARACTERISATION OF CASTRATION-REFRACTORY
PROSTATE CANCER (CRPC) STEM CELLS FROM CLINICAL TUMOUR MATERIAL.
Dr David Hudson, Dr Chris Parker, Dr Johann de Bono, Dr Anne Collins Institute of Cancer Research |
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All tissues in the human body are believed to contain a small number of cells called ‘stem cells’. These stem cells provide a reservoir for growth and cell replacement in each tissue and are important in wound repair. This has led to interest in them as a source of cells for regeneration and potential surgical replacement of tissues such as the liver and most recently the heart.
It has become clear recently that stem cells may also play a role in diseases such as cancer. Stem cells have been identified in cancers such as leukaemia and in solid tumours from breast, brain, colon and pancreatic cancers. Along with others we had previously shown the existence of stem cells in the human prostate and it is now clear that prostate cancers also contain these cells.
Current therapeutic approaches are designed to target the majority of cells in the tumour and it is possible that certain characteristics of stem cells allow them to survive such treatments. In the prostate, stem cells do not require the hormone testosterone to survive although the first line of treatment is to remove testosterone from the circulation (or chemical castration). The result is a reduction in tumour volume and disease symptoms but unfortunately if the tumour has spread throughout the body we believe that small numbers of stem cells may survive and ultimately cause re-growth of the tumour and castration refractory disease relapse.
The aims of this project were to study stem cells from advanced, castration resistant, disease. We have made good advances on this in the first year of the project with a clinical fellow, Dr Alison Reid, funded for 12 months on this grant. Dr Reid has been involved in the collection of patient material from cancer patients and has been involved in isolating stem cells from cultures of these tissues. We have now carried out comparisons between these and benign samples and are currently analysing these results with the aim of identifying what is different about the cancer stem cell that may provide us with an alternative target for therapy in the future.
Research summary dated 20 April 2007
Project 2004/07