Cancer Stem Cells (CSCs) in Drug Resistance and their Therapeutic Implications in Cancer Treatment

Figure 1

The origin of CSCs and combinational therapy of CSC targeting and bulk tumor ablation. CSCs could possibly have originated from either stem cells with mutation/oncogenic transformation, progenitors that have undergone mutation, or from differentiated cells or cancer cells that obtained stem-like properties by dedifferentiation. Thus, because of the plasticity of CSCs, it is suggested that combinational therapy of CSC targeting and bulk tumor ablation may have better therapeutic effects to improve the clinical outcomes of cancer patients.