Heterogeneity in untreated, stressed and drug-tolerant cells: insights into the evolution of cancer resistance
by Bhagya K. Wijayawardena; Gopinath Sivasankaran; Lang Li
International Journal of Computational Biology and Drug Design (IJCBDD), Vol. 11, No. 1/2, 2018

Abstract: The evolution of cancer is a Darwinian process, the composition of cancer cell population varying with time, especially after chemotherapy. Such changes occurring in the genetic landscape of tumours are possibly responsible for the chemotherapeutic resistance. Due to the recent advances in single cellular sequencing, the evolution of cancers can be monitored at the single cellular resolution. We reanalysed a previously published dataset composed of single cell RNAseq data, collected before, during and after the establishment of Paclitaxel tolerance, to identify single cell heterogeneity. We used gene expression analysis, gene expression rank correlation analysis, pathway analysis and mutation analysis to identify within group variations of cancer cells after chemotherapy. We identified a decrease in cancer cell within group diversity during the transition to drug-tolerance. Additionally, we observed high mutation rate in stressed single cells, which suggests genetic instability of cancer cells that could ultimately result in the development of drug resistance. Our analysis carries significant implications for developing personalised and efficient therapeutics against cancer.

Online publication date: Wed, 28-Mar-2018

The full text of this article is only available to individual subscribers or to users at subscribing institutions.

 
Existing subscribers:
Go to Inderscience Online Journals to access the Full Text of this article.

Pay per view:
If you are not a subscriber and you just want to read the full contents of this article, buy online access here.

Complimentary Subscribers, Editors or Members of the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Computational Biology and Drug Design (IJCBDD):
Login with your Inderscience username and password:

Username:        Password:          Forgotten your password?

Want to subscribe?
A subscription gives you complete access to all articles in the current issue, as well as to all articles in the previous three years (where applicable). See our Orders page to subscribe.

If you still need assistance, please email subs@inderscience.com