Cancer stem cell (a)symmetry & plasticity: Tumorigenesis and therapy relevance

Abstract Cancer stem cells (CSCs) are self-renewal population localized within cancer niches and play critical roles in tumor initiation, recurrence and metastasis. Despite extensive research, challenges about identity of CSCs and combating them in cancer therapy still remain steady. Cellular plasticity is a cardinal feature of tumor microenvironment (TME) tremendously influencing tumor aggressive behavior. Plasticity and CSC a (symmetry) are interconnecting processes essential for shaping a cancer through nurturing a wide number of cells with tumor promoting capacities. The plastic nature of TME cellularity infers that destemming just CSCs is not sufficient in respect with therapy, especially for high-grade cancers—instead, deploying mechanisms to retard tumor type-dependent TME-CSC interplay is a suggested strategy for making a durable remission of cancer. This requires extending our understanding about CSC divisional profiling and plasticity in order to find critical drivers in cancer progression.