Revealing Glioblastoma’s Characteristic – Why Doctors Find It Hard to Combat the Disease

Macroscopic pathology of Glioblastoma multiforme
Image: Wikimedia commons, Sbrandne

Glioblastoma is a fast-growing type of malignant brain tumor. Recent studies reveal that the disease has the capability of feeding the cancer cells on its own by making its own network of blood vessels in order to feed the brain tumor.

These findings may help explain why some anti-angiogenesis treatments failed, the brain cancer cells characteristics also affected efforts to find other means of anti-angiogenesis treatment to fight the dreaded disease.

Glioblastomas have unique vasculature, differentiated by large, rapidly increasing cells and abnormal structures. These vessels were thought to be derived from pre-existing brain capillaries according to the researchers. To confirm their findings, they conducted an experiment by isolating tumor cells containing markers suggestive of a stem-cell-like state and injected it into an immunosuppressed mouse. The results once again confirmed their discovery since they found out that a large percentage of blood vessels that developed in the tumors were of human and not of a mouse.

This recent discovery may not be unique in Gliobastomas alone since all tumors have blood vessels. There are possibilities that other cancer form may have the same characteristics; therefore, researchers in other field of cancer research are encouraged to look into the possibilities.