Overview on Clinical Relevance of Intra-Tumor Heterogeneity

Frontiers in Medicine

Giorgio Stanta¹ 

关键词: intra-tumor heterogeneity;    morphohistological intra-tumor heterogeneity;    clonal intra-tumor heterogeneity;    functional phenotypic plasticity;    stochastic plasticity;    cancer spreading;    genomic instability;   

DOI  :  10.3389/fmed.2018.00085

学科分类：医学（综合）

来源: Frontiers

【 摘 要 】

Today, clinical evaluation of tumor heterogeneity is an emergent issue to improve clinical oncology. In particular, intra-tumor heterogeneity (ITH) is closely related to cancer progression, resistance to therapy, and recurrences. It is interconnected with complex molecular mechanisms including spatial and temporal phenomena, which are often peculiar for every single patient. This review tries to describe all the types of ITH including morphohistological ITH, and at the molecular level clonal ITH derived from genomic instability and nonclonal ITH derived from microenvironment interaction. It is important to consider the different types of ITH as a whole for any patient to investigate on cancer progression, prognosis, and treatment opportunities. From a practical point of view, analytical methods that are widely accessible today, or will be in the near future, are evaluated to investigate the complex pattern of ITH in a reproducible way for a clinical application.

【 授权许可】

CC BY