Single-cell technologies uncover intra-tumor heterogeneity in childhood cancers

AbstractChildhood cancer is the second leading cause of death in children aged 1 to 14. Although survival rates have vastly improved over the past 40  years, cancer resistance and relapse remain a significant challenge. Advances in single-cell technologies enable dissection of tumors to unprecedented resolution. This facilitates unraveling the heterogeneity of childhood cancers to identify cell subtypes that are prone to treatment resistance. Th e rapid accumulation of single-cell data from different modalities necessitates the development of novel computational approaches for processing, visualizing, and analyzing single-cell data. Here, we review single-cell approaches utilized or under development in the context of childhood cancers. We review computational methods for analyzing single-cell data and discuss best practices for their application. Finally, we review the impact of several studies of childhood tumors analyzed with these approaches and future directions to implement single-cell studies into translational cancer research in pediatric oncology.
Source: Seminars in Immunopathology - Category: Pathology Source Type: research