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Research Highlights

Nature Reviews Cancer 8, 246–247 (1 April 2008) | doi:10.1038/nrc2358

Radiation therapy: Sensitizing stem cells

Patrick Goymer

Radiation therapy can be followed by recurrence because a small population of cancer stem cells is resistant to the therapy. A new study shows that radiation therapy causes apoptosis in proliferating medulloblastoma cells and only cell-cycle arrest in medulloblastoma stem cells, but this difference can be diminished using a small-molecule inhibitor.