Stromal fibroblasts are cells in our body that provide support and structure to other cells and tissues. They play an important role in wound healing and maintaining the health of organs.
Full definition
Periostin (POSTN) was identified by microarray RNA profiling studies as a stromal factor involved in maintaining the normal stem cell niche and demonstrated to be secreted
by stromal fibroblasts, but not by infiltrating tumor cells (Malanchi et al., 2012).
The key experiments included for replication were selected because they examine the induction of POSTN expression in the
pulmonary stromal fibroblasts and test the role of POSTN in primary tumor formation and metastatic efficiency, which are relevant as the role of POSTN as a possible prognostic marker and target for anticancer therapies is explored (Xu et al., 2012; Nuzzo et al., 2014).
Their first task was to analyse all of the genes that are differentially expressed in
the stromal fibroblasts of the tumour, the CAFs, in comparison with the fibroblasts of healthy pancreatic tissue.
The TGF beta - 1 was produced by
the stromal fibroblasts which surrounded the tumour cells.
Reprogramming of
stromal fibroblasts by SNAI2 contributes to tumor desmoplasia and ovarian cancer progression.
With shRNA in lentiviral vectors, the lab is identifying genes in tumor cells,
stromal fibroblasts, and endothelial cells that are potential targets for therapy.
Thus, it is not unreasonable to suspect that
stromal fibroblasts could influence the metabolism of adjacent cancer cells, and visa versa.