The idea that cancer can hijack brain plasticity — subverting supple connections in the healthy brain that ordinarily lead to learning and memory formation — is gaining traction.
First reported in Cell in 2015, research led by Stanford neuro-oncologist Michelle Monje showed that active nerve cells could promote the growth of high-grade gliomas, a form of brain cancer with a poor prognosis. Four years later, her lab revealed in a Nature paper that synapses between these neurons and gliomas spurred tumor growth, and last year, it was demonstrated how these same synapses revved up glioblastoma’s spread.
There are still many questions about precisely how this process unfolds, and it’s too soon to say how solutions might be reached. But in a new paper published in Nature on Wednesday, Monje’s team solves another part of the puzzle, shining light on the electrochemical signaling pathway between neurons and cancer cells.
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