Chromosomal Copy Number Changes

In addition to mutations caused by DNA sequence deletion, duplication, reversion and translocation, "solid tumors" grown from enriched cancer stem cells often have more dramatic mutations in chromosomal number.

Many of the normal or mutated chromosomes are often doubled, or even tripled. For example, solid-tumors grown from human enriched CancerStemCell™ often have 50 to 95 chromosomes per cell. Much more complicated than DNA sequence deletion, duplication, reversion and translocation, the change of one chromosomal copy may cause hundreds of genes to over-express. For example, if the duplication of chromosomal numbers were in chromosome 11,13, 17 and 19, the net result would be the over expression of hundreds of genes located on those chromosomes. Since enriched cancer stem cells are tumorigenic, heterogeneous, and constantly mutating, thousands of mutations may be occurring at the same time with the combination of deletion, duplication, reversion and translocation. The "solid tumor" initiation and formation may be due to these events, in addition to chromosomal number changes, over-expression of thousands of genes and the uncontrollable cell division.

"Solid tumor" cells grown from enriched cancer stem cells, CancerStemCell™, have all types of mutations, including chromosomal number changes. It is not known which chromosomes are mutated and to what degree this has occurred in any one cancer cell or the heterogeneous population of the "solid tumor" cells. However, the degree of mutations and number of antigens in the "solid tumor" cells are comparable to that of metastasized tumor cells since the whole cell "giant liposome" cancer vaccines, CancerVaccine™, made out of enriched cancer stem cells and metastasized tumor cells have induced similar immune responses.

The mutation and antigen number of different cancer cell origins can be summarized in the following table