Therapy-resistant Gastrointestinal Cancer Stem Cells

In many developed countries, gastrointestinal cancer is a top leading cause of death, exceeded only by heart diseases. Traditionally cancer has been treated with surgery, chemotherapy, hormones and radiation therapy, alone or in combination. However, it is still difficult to cure the patients with advanced cancer radically. This is partly due to the presence of the diversity, or heterogeneity of cancer. The heterogeneity of tumors can be explained with the help of cancer stem cells supported by antiapoptotic signaling. Cancer stem cells mimic normal adult stem cells by demonstrating resistance to toxic injuries and chemoradiation therapy. The underlined phenomenon nevertheless couldn't be discarded towards the complete control of cancer disaster as the whole strategy, and in depth investigation of the factors associated with tumorigenesis is required for achieving it. Given that accumulating evidences suggest that tumor bioenergetics plays a critical role in cancer stem cell regulation, the studies of therapy-resistance have opened up a new era of cancer medicine, which goes beyond cancer genomics. In the Proceedings of the 9th International Gastric Cancer Congress, we will discuss the recent our findings of therapy resistant CSCs in gastrointestinal organs, and we will discuss how we can achieve the complete eradication of cancer toward improving translational research.