Isolation of melanoma tumor-initiating cells from surgical tissues.

A new model of cancer progression has been put forward that predicts existence of tumor stem cells (TSCs) in the heterogeneous bulk tumor mass that self-renew, are resistant to chemo- and radiotherapies, and sustain tumor growth during the course of its progression or relapse (Ailles and Weissman, Curr Opin Biotechnol 18:460-466, 2007; Chan et al., Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 106:14016-14021, 2009; D'Angelo and Wicha, Prog Mol Biol Transl Sci 95:113-158, 2010; O'Brien, Semin Radiat Oncol 19:71-77, 2009; Park et al., Mol Ther 17:219-230, 2009). Using most advanced methods of cell purification and transplantation, our laboratory and another independent study identified melanoma stem cells as CD271(NFGR/p75)+ cells from surgical human specimens (Boiko et al., Nature 466:133-137, 2010; Civenni et al., Cancer Res 71:3098-3109, 2011). Here we describe in great detail an approach for isolating tumor-initiating cells from freshly resected melanomas (Boiko et al., Nature 466:133-137, 2010).