Identification of Molecular Pathways Facilitating Glioma Cell Invasion In Situ

Gliomas are mostly incurable secondary to their diffuse infiltrative nature. Thus, specific therapeutic targeting of invasive glioma cells is an attractive concept. As cells exit the tumor mass and infiltrate brain parenchyma, they closely interact with a changing micro-environmental landscape that sustains tumor cell invasion. In this study, we used a unique microarray profiling approach on a human glioma stem cell (GSC) xenograft model to explore gene expression changes in situ in invading glioma cells compared to tumor core, as well as changes in host cells residing within the infiltrated microenvironment relative to the unaffected cortex. Replicate sets of mice (n=4) were inoculated with either of two different GSC's derived from from human glioma, and each mouse had samples taken from the tumor mass, the infiltrating area and the mouse brain parenchyma, resulting in 3 samples per animal. The tumor mass and infiltrating samples were hybridized on human U133Plus2 Arrays, whereas the infiltrating samples and mouse brain parenchyma were hybridized on mouse