Targeting breast cancer stem cells in mice

Tuesday, June 2, 2009 - 06:21 in Health & Medicine

Cancer develops when cells known as cancer stem cells begin to divide in an uncontrolled manner. Researchers from the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center have identified roles for the gene PTEN, which is already well known for its ability to suppress tumor growth, and for several pathways linked to PTEN in the growth of cells that give rise to breast cancer. The work, published in this week's issue of the open-access journal PLoS Biology, also reports that a drug that interferes with the activity of one of these pathways leads to a 90 percent decrease in the number of cells able to form tumors in mice.

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