Deconvoluting infiltration in glioblastoma

摘要

Neurosurgeons face a challenging task of surgically resecting tumor cells that have diffusely infiltrated into surrounding brain tissue. The extent of resection is directly proportional to survival, with a more aggressive approach conferring a survival advantage for GBM patients. Despite this knowledge, the non-enhancing (NE) regions of the tumor margin cannot be fully removed. Therefore, understanding the molecular and cellular composition of these infiltrating tumors is critical to identifying molecular targets for this disease. While studies by multiple groups, including efforts by The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), have identified molecular subtypes of GBM, tumor specimens that have been used in these studies are mostly derived from the contrast-enhancing (CE) core.