Cellular Plasticity of Epithelial Cells-Cause of Metastasis

Abstract

Metastasis is a major factor contributing to casualties in cancer patients. In this award, we sought to address critical questions as to how the rare metastatic epithelial cells can find and contact the much rarer angiogenic endothelial cells, or how a new angiogeneic network is setup. We present a novel concept that cancer epithelial cells, possibly of stem cell origin, have inherent cellular plasticity and can differentiate into endothelial cells and form microvessels that serve as a conduit for entry of epithelial cells To test this hypothesis we marked metastatic breast cancer cells with GFP and looked for expression of endothelial markers in the green epithelial cells.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Sep 01, 2005
Accession Number
ADA448411

Entities

People

  • Saraswati Sukumar

Organizations

  • Johns Hopkins University

Tags

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Biomedical Research
  • Blood Vessels
  • Breast Cancer
  • Cancer
  • Casualties
  • Cell Line
  • Cells
  • Endothelial Cells
  • Epithelial Cells
  • Mammary Glands
  • Metastasis
  • Microvessels
  • Neoplasms
  • Plastic Properties
  • Stem Cells
  • Tumor Cell Line

Fields of Study

  • Biology

Readers

  • Oncology (Cancer Research).

Technology Areas

  • Biotechnology