Rescue of Targeted Nonstem-Like Cells from Bystander Stem-Like Cells in Human Fibrosarcoma HT1080.

Cancer stem-like cells (CSCs) have been suggested to be the principal cause of tumor radioresistance, dormancy and recurrence after radiotherapy. However, little is known about CSC behavior in response to clinical radiotherapy, particularly with regard to CSC communication with bulk cancer cells. In this study, CSCs and nonstem-like cancer cells (NSCCs) were co-cultured, and defined cell types were chosen and irradiated, respectively, with proton microbeam. The bidirectional rescue effect in the combinations of the two cell types was then investigated. The results showed that out of all four combinations, only the targeted, proton irradiated NSCCs were protected by bystander CSCs and showed less accumulation of 53BP1, which is a widely used indicator for DNA double-strand breaks. In addition, supplementation with c-PTIO, a specific nitric oxide scavenger, can show a similar effect on targeted NSCCs. These results, showed that the rescue effect of CSCs on targeted NSCCs involves nitric oxide in the process, suggesting that the cellular communication between CSCs and NSCCs may be important in determining the survival of tumor cells after radiation therapy. To our knowledge, this is the first report demonstrating a rescue effect of CSCs to irradiated NSCCs that may help us better understand CSC behavior in response to cancer radiotherapy.