HISTOLOGY AND HISTOPATHOLOGY

From Cell Biology to Tissue Engineering

 

Review

Ecology of melanoma cell

Lukáš Lacina1,2,3, Ondřej Kodet1,2,3, Barbora Dvořánková1,2, Pavol Szabo1,2 and Karel Smetana Jr1,2

1Charles University, Frist Faculty of Medicine, Institute of Anatomy, Prague, 2Charles University, Frist Faculty of Medicine, BIOCEV, Vestec and 3Charles University, Frist Faculty of Medicine, Department of Dermatology and Venereology, Prague, Czech Republic

Offprint requests to: Karel Smetana Jr, Charles University, Institute of Anatomy, U Nemocnice 3, 128 00 Prague 2, Czech Republic. e-mail: karel.smetana@lf1.cuni.cz


Summary. Melanoma represents a cancer with increasing incidence worldwide and limited curability of advanced stages of the disease. Similarly to other types of tumors, the microenvironment is an important factor that participates in the control of melanoma biological properties. This review summarizes data regarding the role of the microenvironment, namely fibroblasts, keratinocytes and infiltrating immune cells, on melanoma growth and spreading. The role of embryonic microenvironment on melanoma cell biological properties is also discussed. The potential of therapeutic targeting of the melanoma microenvironment is demonstrated. Histol Histopathol 33, 247-254 (2018)

Key words: Neural crest, Melanoma, Cancer microenvironment, Cancer-associated fibroblast, Immune cell, Stem cell niche

DOI: 10.14670/HH-11-926