Surface phenotype of human carcinoma cancer stem cells (CSC)

Tumor is composed of a heterogenous mass of cells. Similar to normal healthy organs and tissues, these can be divided into individual cellular subpopulations according to morphology, function and expression patterns. A subpopulation of cells that are able to give rise to all of these cellular lineages is referred to as cancer stem cells (CSC). CSCs have the capabilities of normal stem cells such as the self-renewal and the ability to give rise to a heterogenous population of differentiated cells. Usually, this is the most resistant subpopulation within a tumor, highly non-responsive to therapy. Doing so, they are the cause of residual disease. Characterisation of CSC markers of individual tumor types is beneficial since it enables higher therapy efficacy via targeting this cell population. The -omics approaches to characterisation of the surface proteome bring a broader view into the field when searching for a unique gene signature of specific cancer stem cell types. It has been found that these cells can be identified based on the high expression levels of CD44, CD90 and CD49f. Among other markers, CD47 is an important marker for its immunosuppressive function