sea-maid submitted, created time 6 months 1 week (www.jcb.org)

Mutant receptors made in one tumor cell can be passed to tumor cells lacking them.

In this study, the authors found that glioma cells expressing EGFRvIII transferred this errant receptor to nonexpressing cells via microvesicles--small plasma membrane buds. The microvesicles were produced in abundance by the mutant expressing cells and were widely taken up by receptor-negative cells. Within 24 hours, these recipient cells had increased receptor-triggered downstream signaling and, compared with cells without receptors, could form twice as many colonies in agar--a standard sign of increased malignancy.

Keywords: glioma microvesicles EGFRvIII oncogenes oncogenic receptors cancer cells cancer tumor cells tumors