Comparison of methods for cancer stem cell detection in prognosis of early stages NSCLC

Boutaîna Chandouri (1) , Thomas Naves (1) , May Yassine (1) , Léa Ikhlef (1) , Jérémy Tricard (2, 1) , Alain Chaunavel (3) , Zeinab Homayed (4) , Julie Pannequin (4) , Nicolas Girard (5, 6) , Stéphanie Durand (1) , Vincent Carré , Fabrice Lalloué (1)

1 CAPTuR - Contrôle de l’Activation Cellulaire, Progression Tumorale et Résistance thérapeutique
2 Service de Chirurgie Thoracique et Vasculaire - Médecine vasculaire [CHU Limoges]
3 Hôpital Dupuytren [CHU Limoges]
4 IGF - Institut de Génomique Fonctionnelle
5 Institut Curie [Paris]
6 UVSQ - Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines

Background: Despite advances in diagnosis and treatment in lung cancer, therapies still fail to improve patient management due to resistance mechanisms and relapses. As Cancer stem cells (CSCs) directly contribute to tumor growth and therapeutic resistance, their clinical detection represents a major challenge. However specific and additional CSC markers lack. Thus, our aim was to achieve selective detection of CSCs with specific glycan patterns and assess the CSCs burden to predict the risk of relapse in NSCLC tumors. Methods: The lung CSCs detection and sorting with a lectin MIX were assessed and compared to CD133 in vitro. Then, its putative role as CSC biomarker was evaluated in vivo and its clinical significance on 221 NSCLC patients. Results: We showed a significant CSCs enrichment in the MIX+ sorted fraction compared to CD133+ cells and confirmed its high tumorigenic capacity. The MIX prognostic value on the overall survival from early stages patients was validated suggesting its potential for detecting CSCs directly linked to tumor aggressiveness. Conclusion: The MIX could be more relevant for detecting and sorting CSCs than CD133. Moreover, its prognosis value could enable clinicians to better classify early-stage patients at high risk of relapse in order to tailor therapeutic decisions.

Domaines: Cancer; Médecine humaine et pathologie

Boutaîna Chandouri, Thomas Naves, May Yassine, Léa Ikhlef, Jérémy Tricard, et al.. Comparison of methods for cancer stem cell detection in prognosis of early stages NSCLC. British Journal of Cancer, 2024, 131 (9), pp.1425-1436. ⟨10.1038/s41416-024-02839-9⟩. ⟨hal-04710240⟩