Osteogenic and Adipogenic Differentiation of Osteosarcoma Cells

Autor: Upal Basu-Roy, Claudio Basilico, Alka Mansukhani
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2012
Předmět:
Zdroj: Bio-Protocol, Vol 2, Iss 24 (2012)
Druh dokumentu: article
ISSN: 2331-8325
DOI: 10.21769/BioProtoc.308
Popis: Osteosarcomas are the most common primary, non-hematologic malignant tumors in childhood and adolescence, comprising almost 60% of all bone sarcomas. Although these tumors are osteoblastic in nature, the characteristics of the specific tumor-initiating cells are unclear. Osteosarcomas contain highly proliferative undifferentiated malignant cells with a disrupted bone differentiation program. Cancer stem cells (CSCs) that have tumor-initiating properties and capacity of symmetric and asymmetric division have now been described in many solid tumors. For osteosarcomas, the CSC hypothesis has received support from recently reported findings that both human and murine osteosarcomas contain a sub-population of multipotent cells that that express various mesenchymal stem cell surface markers and are capable of undergoing differentiation in multiple mesenchymal lineages such as osteoblasts and adipocytes. Differentiation into these different lineages can be easily assessed by growing cells in specific medium and assaying for differentiation markers.
Databáze: Directory of Open Access Journals