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Source of initial fusion event

Posted by jpawelek on 09 Jul 2013 at 19:39 GMT

As in the manuscript “the patient was diagnosed with metastatic melanoma involving lymph nodes, liver and brain, derived from an unknown primary tumor.” So the initial fusion could have occurred at any of these sites or others unknown. Since we had access to only a single brain metastasis, we were unable to determine the source of the fusion event. Clues from pathology studies are consistent with BMDC-tumor cell fusion occurring in the early in situ tumor, transforming these non-malignant, non-motile cells into malignant, invasive hybrids (Lazova R, Klump V, Pawelek J. J. Cutan Pathol, 2010;37:256-268.). But this remains to be seen for future studies.
John Pawelek
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No competing interests declared.
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