In cancer stem cells it is always mentioned that they have stemness properties and self-renewal ability. Are those the same thing but different names or there is a difference?
In the context of cancer stem cells, 'stemness' would refer to the ability of those cancer stem cells to replicate themselves and their potential to differentiate into other types of cells that make up the tumour. So stemness is a combination of 'self-renewal' and 'differentiation' capabilities. In theory, you could have a cell population that can self-renew but not differentiate, in which case they would be missing that property of stemness.
Hi Osama, in my experience with epithelial stem cells (not cancer) "stemness" denotes the ability of: 1) a cell to self-renew (replacement), and 2) make all of the lineages found in the epithelium in which it resides. Granted cancer cells are often poorly differentiated, I assume cancer stem cells (CSCs) should follow the same criteria of being able to make more CSCs, and also the other cell types found in the tumors.
In cancer at least I think it should be better to speak about "cancer initiating cells" instead of cancer stem cells. I would keep the concept of cancer stem cells limited to normal cells.
What's the difference?
Stem cells may self renew and differentiate while cancer initiating cells, though they renew, they do not differentiate. Stem cells and cancer initiating cells may have the same phenotype, but undoubtedly the genotype is different. It also implies the concept that any malignant cell at a certain moment or under certain stimulus may become a cancer initiating cell, but it will never become a stem cell.
This concepts are not universally accepted but I think it has some practical value.
Just to add to the previous valuable comments, Cancer stem cells are also have the ability to resist "Anoikis" which is a kind of apoptosis which kills cells when they are not attached to a substrate. CSCs could divide on ultralow attachment plates. Also I believe that resistance to Therapy is one of the stemness properties which may apply to both CSCs and normal stem cells.
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