Colon cancer-associated fibroblast establishment and culture growth

Cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) are one of the major players in tumor-stroma crosstalk. Findings in experimental studies suggest important roles for CAFs in regulation of tumor growth, metastasis and drug response (Hanahan and Coussens, 2012). Furthermore, their clinical relevance is supported by new findings from tumor analyses, demonstrating the prognostic and response-predictive significance of CAF-derived markers or gene signatures (Berdiel-hacer et al., 2014; Finak et al., 2008; Navab et al., 2011; Paulsson and Micke, 2014). CAFs are a heterogeneous pool of cell subsets with distinct functions which needs to be better defined by their marker expressions. The development of a methodology for the establishment of fibroblast primary cultures derived from human colon tumors allowed us to characterize their functional and molecular properties (Herrera et al., 2013). In addition, the different molecular mechanisms through which CAFs affect tumor growth and metastasis are still to be clarified. Therefore, functional and molecular characterization of the cancer-associated fibroblasts is essential to fully understand their role in tumor progression.This research is supported by PI12/02037, RD12/0036/0041 and RD12/0036/0021 from the Instituto de Salud Carlos III-FEDER; by the Fundación Científica AECC; by SAF2010-20750 from the Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad of Spain-FEDER; by S2010/BMD-2344 from the Comunidad de Madrid; and by the Fundación Banco Santander. Antonio García de Herreros’ laboratory is supported by RD12/0036/0005 (from the Instituto de Salud Carlos III-FEDER) and SAF2013-48849-C2-1-R (from the Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad of Spain-FEDER). Cristina Peña is a recipient of a Miguel Servet Contract from the Instituto de Salud Carlos III.Peer Reviewe