Abstract
The recognition that the persistence of cancer stem cells (CSCs) in patients following chemotherapy can result in disease relapse underscores the necessity to develop therapeutics against those cells. CSCs display a unique repertoire of cell surface macromolecules, which have proven essential for their characterization and isolation. Additionally, CSC-specific cell surface macromolecules or markers provide targets for the development of specific agents to destroy them. In this review, we compiled those cell surface molecules that have been validated as CSC markers for many common blood and solid tumors. We describe the unique chemical and structural features of the most common cell surface markers, as well as recent efforts to deliver chemotherapeutic agents into CSCs by targeting those macromolecules.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 121-142 |
| Number of pages | 22 |
| Journal | Drug Delivery and Translational Research |
| Volume | 3 |
| Issue number | 2 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Apr 2013 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:Support from the American Cancer Society (IRG-58-001-52-IRG68), the Danny Thompson Memorial Golf Tournament (UMN) Leukemia Research Fund, and the University of Minnesota is gratefully acknowledged. D.W. thanks the American Heart Association (11PRE7240035) for a predoctoral fellowship.
Keywords
- Anticancer agents
- Cancer stem cell markers
- Cancer stem cells
- Cell surface proteins
- Disease relapse
- Flow cytometry
