2009 Public Lecture Series
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Cancer Stem Cells: When Longevity is Counterproductive
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Cancers arise from adult stem cells normally present in tissue, but which become malignant by various mechanisms. Genetic mutations, bacteria, viruses and chemicals each can trigger a process that arrests or reverses differentiation or activates some other cellular misstep that leads to cancer. The origin of liver, stomach, blood and other cancers will be presented and therapy directed to stem cells discussed. The stem cell theory of cancer implies that cancers are made up of the same cell populations as normal tissues: long-lived stem cells, transit amplifying cells and mature differentiated cells. Conventional therapies are directed toward amplifying cells that still are undergoing cell division. When these therapies are discontinued, the cancer will often re-grow from the cancer stem cells, which are not proliferating at the time therapy is administered. In order to prevent re-growth new therapies must be developed that are directed to the cancer stem cells.
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Stewart Sell, M.D.
Dr. Sell received his B.S. from the College of William and Mary and his medical degree from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, which in 2005 named him a Legacy Laureate, the school's highest distinction for an alumnus. After a residency at Massachusetts General Hospital and a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Birmingham, England, Dr. Sell joined Pittsburgh's Department of Pathology, then spent more than a decade each at the University of California, San Diego, and the University of Texas Medical School at Houston. In 2003, he joined the Wadsworth Center as a research physician and the Ordway Research Institute, Inc., as a senior scientist, where he studies cancer and aging. He also is a professor in the University at Albany's School of Public Health, Department of Biomedical Sciences. Dr. Sell's research has been continuously funded by the National Institutes of Health since 1965 and resulted in more than 350 papers and 14 books. He has received numerous honors, including a lifetime achievement award from Abbott Laboratories given to scientists in the international community who have made an outstanding contribution to the fields of basic oncology or clinical oncology.