Other than the neurons, the brain also shelters another type of cell: the glial cells. These are essential support cells for the smooth working of the neurons, which allow the latter to be activated, providing them with energy and protecting them. Glioblastoma is the most aggressive form of the tumours which strike the glial cells. Its prognostic is always fatal, but researchers have just discovered a trail which might allow the recurrence to be slowed down.

A Primary cerebral tumour which is the most frequent and aggressive in adults, glioblastoma is a dreadful disease, as much for the fact that it breaks out without any warning as for its devastating character. Always fatal, it affects 3 to 4 new people out of 100,000 inhabitants each year, with a frequency peak between 50 and 70 years, and carries off half of its patients during the year it is diagnosed. Less than 5% of them survive over three years once the tumour has been detected. "For certain patients, this tumour has been depicted as occurring in a context of genetic familial diseases but this type of situation is very rare. Nevertheless in nearly every case there are no risk factors linked to this disease, and it occurs in sporadic fashion," indicates Manuel Deprez, a doctor in the pathological anatomy department at the Liege University Hospital Centre and a lecturer in neuropathology at the ULg.

When the prognosis stagnates…

Other than the neurons, the brain also shelters another type of cell: the glial cells. "They are support cells which are essential for the neurons functioning well. They enable the latter to be activated, provide them with energy and protect them," explains Manuel Deprez. The glial cells also clear the neurons of damaging products which have to be got rid off, and encourage nerve conduction by constituting an insulating tube around axonal and dendritic nerve extensions. As will now be clear, if the neurons are often on centre stage and are better known by the general public, glial cells are actors in the shadows which are just as indispensable for cerebral activity!

"Gliomas are the tumours which affect the glial cells and glioblastoma is the most aggressive form of these tumours," specifies the neuropathologist. "Whilst we can improve the living conditions of patients struck by this pathology, it is one of the rare tumours for which there have been no significant developments in terms of prognosis," he continues.

As far as the molecular cause of the appearance of such a tumour is concerned, the most commonly accepted theory considers that the problem is situated within cells called ‘stem cells or progenitor cells,’ on the basis of which the neurons and the glial cells differentiate themselves. "At a given moment the cells could be subject to a mutation or another genetic or epigenetic alteration and be transformed into cancerous cells," explains Manuel Deprez.