Luis F. Parada, PhD (Damon Runyon Fellow ‘85-‘86) and colleagues at University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, used genetic techniques to track cancer cells. They found that glioblastoma brain cancers contained a small number of stem cells that are resistant to chemotherapy and can give rise to tumor cells. This study—along with two separate studies conducted independently by other research groups—confirms the existence of cancer stem cells, and the researchers are now searching for ways to kill these cells. These results were published in the journal Nature.
