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01/05: Agency research provides advance in understanding breast stem cells
Nature Press Release:
A major advance that could refocus research on the development and treatment of breast cancer is being published today in two papers that will appear in the prestigious journal Nature. These articles provide the first proof that a unique stem cell population can be isolated from normal adult breast tissue. Both papers are authored by scientists at the BC Cancer Agency, an agency of the Provincial Health Services Authority, in collaboration with scientists in Melbourne, Australia.
Stem cells are master cells that can produce the bulk of the cells that make up a particular tissue. They serve as the starting material and, in the adult, these cells are responsible for lifelong maintenance and repair of the tissue. There has been growing evidence that most tissues contain stem cells. But in most cases there has been no way of isolating these cells as a separate population in order to be able to analyze their properties.
Dr. John Stingl, the lead author on the Vancouver paper points out that, “Understanding the properties of normal breast stem cells should give us an important leg up on how breast cancer gets started and on identifying new targets for treating breast cancer more effectively.”
“Our results are very exciting because this is the first time a cell population has been purified from a normal adult organ other than blood or bone marrow and then shown to have tissue-specific stem cell activity in a living animal,” explains Dr. Connie Eaves, the senior author of one of the papers, and Deputy Director of the Terry Fox Laboratory at the BC Cancer Agency and Professor of Medical Genetics at the University of British Columbia.
“Demonstrating the ability of a single purified cell to regenerate a whole tissue is the gold standard since other methods for testing cells in tissue culture have often ended up leading researchers astray.”
“Our results now give a much more solid foundation for the idea that cancers in many sites begin when normal stem cells start to go awry. This concept has been accepted in leukemia for a long time, but it is still a controversial idea when it comes to cancers of other tissues like breast, prostate and liver,” says Dr. Eaves.
One of the unexpected findings from the studies was that breast cells are normally a rapidly dividing population. Each time a stem cell divides, there is the possibility of a mutation appearing. Cells that proliferate continuously therefore have a greater chance of acquiring cancer-causing mutations. “Perhaps this may be one reason why breast cancer is so common in women,” suggests Dr. Eaves.
Dr. Eaves is already recognized as a world authority on blood-forming stem cells in both normal and pathological states and she has made major contributions to the understanding of Chronic Myelogenous Leukemia and the management of that disease. She first became interested in breast stem cells 10 years ago when the possibility was raised that bone marrow transplants might be useful in the treatment of breast cancer and she began experiments to study the types of human breast cells that can grow in tissue culture.
"Dr. Eaves' study represents an important and seminal contribution to mammary stem cell biology that will provide a new avenue to investigate the cellular and molecular basis of breast cancer," Dr. Micheal Rudnicki, Scientific Director of the Canadian Stem Cell Network.
The research performed in Vancouver was made possible by support from the Canadian Stem Cell Network, Genome Canada, Genome BC, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation, and the BC Cancer Foundation.
The BC Cancer Agency, a part of the Provincial Health Services Authority, is committed to reducing the incidence of cancer, reducing the mortality from cancer, and improving the quality of life of those living with cancer. It provides a comprehensive cancer control program for the people of British Columbia by working with community partners to deliver a range of oncology services, including prevention, early detection, diagnosis and treatment, research, education, supportive care, rehabilitation and palliative care. The BC Cancer Foundation supports research and care enhancements at the BC Cancer Agency.
For more information, please contact:
Nicole Adams
Communications Specialist
BC Cancer Agency
604.877.6272
nadams@bccancer.bc.ca
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