Department of Neurosurgery, The First Affiliated Hospital, China Medical University, 110001 Shenyang, Liaoning Province, People's Republic of China.
Med Oncol. 2012 Mar;29(1):324-31. doi: 10.1007/s12032-010-9765-z. Epub 2010 Dec 14.
Glioblastoma is one of the most angiogenic human tumors and characterized by microvascular proliferations. A better understanding of glioblastoma vasculature is needed to optimize anti-angiogenic therapy that has shown a promising but incomplete efficacy. The present study examined 48 glioblastomas by CD34 endothelial marker periodic acid-Schiff (PAS) dual staining and found non-endothelial cell-lined blood vessels that were formed by tumor cells (vasculogenic mimicry, VM) existing in a fraction of these tumors. We hypothesized that CD133-positive glioblastoma stem-like cells (GSCs) may play a pivotal role in glioblastoma VM formation and then demonstrated in vitro and in vivo that a subset of GSCs were capable of vasculogenesis. Moreover, we found that several growth factors involved in normal angiogenesis were expressed in GSCs. We describe here a new mechanism of alternative glioblastoma vascularization and open a new perspective for the anti-vascular treatment strategy.
胶质母细胞瘤是最具血管生成能力的人类肿瘤之一，其特征为微血管增殖。为了优化抗血管生成治疗，需要更好地了解胶质母细胞瘤的血管生成，该治疗方法已显示出有一定疗效，但并不完全有效。本研究通过 CD34 内皮标志物过碘酸-Schiff（PAS）双重染色检查了 48 例胶质母细胞瘤，发现了存在于这些肿瘤的一部分中的肿瘤细胞形成的非内皮细胞衬里的血管（血管生成拟态，VM）。我们假设 CD133 阳性胶质母细胞瘤干细胞样细胞（GSCs）可能在胶质母细胞瘤 VM 形成中起关键作用，然后在体外和体内证明了一小部分 GSCs能够血管生成。此外，我们发现一些参与正常血管生成的生长因子在 GSCs 中表达。我们在这里描述了一种替代胶质母细胞瘤血管生成的新机制，并为抗血管治疗策略开辟了新的视角。
