Precision cancer therapeutics for glioma

Abstract

Malignant glioma is the most common primary brain tumor. Over the past four decades, intensive researches and studies have made breakthroughs in survival. However, the overall prognosis is still very poor with short survival. Glioblastoma was one of the first selected tumors for the Cancer Genome Atlas project which had gained understanding in tumor biology and gliomagenesis. Despite all these understandings, targeted therapies and precision therapeutics have not made any impact in the overall survival and outcomes. The concept of precision personalized cancer therapy is appealing and is desperately needed to be materialized for glioma. The issues of tumor heterogeneity in glioma and drug screening are crucial to our further understanding and to the ultimate solution. This article will discuss the potential and challenges of precision cancer therapeutics for glioma.

Keywords

• Drug screening
• glioblastoma
• heterogeneity
• molecular profiling
• precision therapeutics