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Leukaemia follows a blood-vessel track to enter the nervous system

Certain cancers are prone to invade the nervous system, which leads to poorer prognosis. A study of leukaemia in mice reveals an unexpectedly direct invasion route from the bone marrow to the central nervous system.
  1. Frank Winkler

    1. Frank Winkler is in the Department of Neurology, University Hospital Heidelberg, and is also at the German Cancer Research Center, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany.

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If malignant cells from solid or blood cancers enter the central nervous system (CNS) and grow there, the treatment options and clinical outlook deteriorate rapidly. In a type of leukaemia called acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL), invasion of the CNS commonly occurs. To try to limit this, people with the condition often receive radiation or chemotherapy that targets the CNS. If more-effective and less-toxic approaches became available to prevent disease spread to the CNS, this might benefit many people with ALL. Writing in Nature, Yao et al.1 report a hitherto unknown route that ALL cells use to enter the CNS, and suggest a possible therapeutic approach that is worth investigating.

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Nature 560, 35-36 (2018)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-05693-x

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