Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2017

Publication Title

Drugs in R&D

Volume

17

Issue

2

First Page

255

Last Page

263

Abstract

Despite extensive efforts and continual progress in research and medicine, outcomes for patients with high-grade glioma remain exceptionally poor. Over the past decade, research has revealed a great deal about the complex biology behind glioma development, and has brought to light some of the major barriers preventing successful treatment. Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) (stage 4 astrocytoma) is a highly dynamic tumour and one of the most extreme examples of intratumoural heterogeneity, making targeting with specific therapeutics an inefficient and highly unpredictable goal. The cancer stem cell hypothesis offers a new view on the possible mechanisms dictating the heterogeneous nature of this disease and contributes to our understanding of glioma resistance and recurrence. Revealing cell division characteristics of initiating cell populations within GBM may represent novel treatment targets and/or the effective repurposing of existing therapies. In this review, we discuss the potential role of targeting the cyclin-dependent kinases (CDKs) driving this specific population. We also describe developments using multi-omic approaches that may aid in stratifying patient populations for CDK inhibitor therapy.

DOI

10.1007/s40268-017-0180-1

Comments

This work is supported by the Canadian Cancer Society Research Institute Innovation to Impact Grant # 703877.

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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