{"id":206887,"date":"2025-02-21T02:04:28","date_gmt":"2025-02-21T08:04:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/02\/stopping-cancer-cells-from-infiltrating-nervous-system"},"modified":"2025-02-21T02:04:28","modified_gmt":"2025-02-21T08:04:28","slug":"stopping-cancer-cells-from-infiltrating-nervous-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/02\/stopping-cancer-cells-from-infiltrating-nervous-system","title":{"rendered":"Stopping cancer cells from infiltrating nervous system"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"padding-right: 20px\"><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/stopping-cancer-cells-from-infiltrating-nervous-system2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>About 15 years ago, Stanford Medicine neuro-oncologist <a href=\"https:\/\/profiles.stanford.edu\/michelle-monje-deisseroth\">Michelle Monje<\/a>, MD, PhD, began to suspect that the brain tumors she studied were doing something strange. Cancer cells sometimes copycat their healthy counterparts, so Monje and her team weren\u2019t surprised to uncover simple parallels between healthy and malignant brain cells. The cancer\u2019s biological \u201cborrowing\u201d was similar to a symphony-goer who whistles the theme from a concerto on the bus ride home.<\/p>\n<p>But the team\u2019s data hinted that these brain tumors were orchestrating something much more complex. Instead of just humming the themes of healthy brain biology, the research suggested the tumors could round up many important cell-signaling instruments \u2014 the microscopic equivalents of, say, violins, cellos, flutes and trombones \u2014 and use them to play a score of its own.<\/p>\n<p>In physiologic terms, Monje\u2019s team gradually demonstrated, certain cancer cells form working electrical connections with nearby nerves. The tumors wire themselves neatly into the brain\u2019s electrical apparatus, then use healthy nerves\u2019 signals for their own purposes \u2014 to drive malignant growth. These cancers also hijack the machinery of learning to strengthen connections with the healthy brain and further enhance their ability to multiply.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>About 15 years ago, Stanford Medicine neuro-oncologist Michelle Monje, MD, PhD, began to suspect that the brain tumors she studied were doing something strange. Cancer cells sometimes copycat their healthy counterparts, so Monje and her team weren\u2019t surprised to uncover simple parallels between healthy and malignant brain cells. The cancer\u2019s biological \u201cborrowing\u201d was similar to [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":662,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,42,47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-206887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-media-arts","category-neuroscience"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/662"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=206887"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206887\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=206887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=206887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=206887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}