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> 1-minute animation: What is a cancer stem cell? (https://www.elsevier.com/connect/1-minute-animation-w…

1-minute animation: What is a cancer stem cell?

Why cancer stem cells are unique and not effectively killed by chemotherapy
By Ben Paylor and Mike Long, PhD
    Posted on 30 March 2015

What is a cancer stem cell? Narrated by Dr. John Dick (https://vimeo.com/109846660) from Stem
Cell Network (https://vimeo.com/stemcellnetwork) on Vimeo (https://vimeo.com) .

Cancer stem cells (CSCs) are cancer cells that have all the classical properties of normal stem cells.
Specifically, they are
Search by keyword, title,able to both
subject area give rise to more copies of themselves (self renewal) and to give
rise to all cell types found in the cancer (differentiation). Of all the cancerous cells in a tumor, CSCs
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are thought to be tumorigenic 💬 (tumor-forming),
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cancer cells. Because of this, if CSCs are not eliminated by radiotherapy or chemotherapy, they are


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able to cause relapse and metastasis by giving rise to new tumors. And because they do not divide
rapidly, they are not effectively killed by chemotherapy. Therefore, development of specific
therapies targeted at CSCs holds hope for improvement of survival and quality of life of cancer
patients.

StemCellShorts are narrated by experts in various aspects of stem cell research who are based in
Canada. This one is narrated by Dr. John Dick
(http://www.uhnres.utoronto.ca/researchers/profile.php?lookup=1468) , Senior Scientist at
the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre at the University of Toronto.

About StemCellShorts
StemCellShorts are the brainchild of Ben Paylor (https://www.linkedin.com/pub/ben-
paylor/4a/94/b81) (@BenPaylor (https://twitter.com/BenPaylor) ), a PhD candidate in
Experimental Medicine at the University of British Columbia (http://www.ubc.ca) , and Dr.
Mike Long, a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Toronto.

The latest videos are jointly funded by the Canadian Stem Cell Network
(http://www.stemcellnetwork.ca) and Canadian Stem Cell Foundation
(http://stemcellfoundation.ca/en) . They are produced at the Vancouver-based animation
studio InfoShots (@InfoShots (https://twitter.com/infoshots) ), with award-winning animator
David Murawsky (http://www.davidmurawsky.com) and Emmy-nominated composer James
Wallace (http://www.jameswallace.net) creating the animations and music.

Recently, StemCellShorts received Honorable Mention in the Video category of the National
Science Foundation's Visualization of Science competition
(http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/scivis/winners_2013.jsp#video) . The videos were
selected out of 227 entries submitted from 17 countries and were bested only by a video
submitted by a team from NASA.

Elsevier Connect Contributors

Ben Paylor (https://www.linkedin.com/pub/ben-
paylor/4a/94/b81) (@BenPaylor
(https://twitter.com/BenPaylor) ) is a PhD
candidate in the Experimental Medicine program
under the supervision of Dr. Fabio Rossi
Search by keyword, title, subject area
(http://medgen.med.ubc.ca/person/fabio-rossi/)
at the University of British Columbia
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💬 Comments
(http://www.ubc.ca) . His research focuses on
 Ben Paylor understanding the role of tissue-resident Mike Long, PhD


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mesenchymal progenitors in repair processes of
the heart. He is a 2012-13 Action Canada
(http://www.actioncanada.ca) fellow and 2014-15 Friedman Scholar. (http://grad-
postdoc.med.ubc.ca/friedman-award/)

Paylor completed a Bachelor of Medical Science at the University of Western Ontario

(http://www.uwo.ca/) , which included a 1-year research exchange to Umea in Northern Sweden.
After that, he, he completed a Master of Philosophy degree in Cardiovascular Biology and Medicine
at Maastricht University (http://www.maastrichtuniversity.nl) in the Netherlands.

He is also very interested in the field of science communication and policy. He is the co-founder
and director of InfoShots (http://www.infoshots.com) and writer and director of several award-
winning science films. Outside of science, he is an avid pianist and tennis player.

Dr. Mike Long earned his PhD in the Department of Medical Genetics at the University of British
Columbia (http://medgen.med.ubc.ca/) , where he was also involved in the creation of several
start-up companies, including the animation studio InfoShots (http://infoshots.com) and the iOS
development company Watermelon App Works Inc.

As a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Toronto (http://www.utoronto.ca) , he is currently

focused on the identification of ligands for orphan nuclear receptors and remains involved in a
number science communication and education projects.

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