breast cancer stem cells

[BMC Cancer] The authors explored how co-expression of progranulin and sortilin was associated with established clinical markers by analyzing a tissue microarray including 560 randomized premenopausal breast cancer patients receiving either two years of tamoxifen treatment or no adjuvant treatment, with a median follow-up time of 28 years.

[Biomedicines] The authors isolated and characterized breast cancer stem cells from a triple-negative breast cancer cell line, MDA-MB-231. The obtained mammospheres were then treated with the specific PPARα antagonist GW6471, after which, glucose, lipid metabolism, and invasiveness were analyzed.

[Cancer Cell International] Investigators summarize the critical roles of miRNAs in regulating multiple signaling pathways such as Wnt/β-catenin, Notch, PI3K/AKT/mTOR, BMI-1 and STAT3 that are important for the breast cancer stem cell maintenance.

[Oncogene] The enhanced long noncoding RNA KB-1980E6.3 facilitated breast cancer stem cells self-renewal and tumorigenesis under hypoxic microenvironment both in vitro and in vivo.

[International Journal of Biological Sciences] Investigators revealed that HES1 is a novel transcriptional activator for Slug through acting directly on its promoter. HES1 knockdown reduced breast cancer stem cell (BCSC) self-renewal, BCSC population, and cancer cell proliferation in TNBC, whereas overexpression of Slug restored the oncogenic function of HES1, both in vitro and in vivo.

[Pharmacological Research] One major challenge is determining the cancer stem cell properties that can be exploited as therapeutic targets. Another challenge is identifying suitable breast cancer stem cells (BCSC) biomarkers to assess the efficacy of novel BCSC-targeted therapies.