Description
Glioblastoma (GBM) is the most common primary brain tumor with an incidence of approximately 11,000 Americans. Despite decades of research, average survival for GBM patients is a modest 15 months. Increasing the extent of GBM resection increases patient survival. However, extending neurosurgical margins also threatens the removal of eloquent brain. For this reason, the infiltrative nature of GBM is an obstacle to its complete resection. We hypothesize that targeting genes and proteins that regulate GBM motility, and developing techniques that safely enhance extent of surgical resection, will improve GBM patient survival by decreasing infiltration into eloquent brain regions and enhancing tumor cytoreduction during surgery. Chapter 2 of this dissertation describes a gene and protein we identified; aquaporin-1 (aqp1) that enhances infiltration of GBM. In chapter 3, we describe a method for enhancing the diagnostic yield of GBM patient biopsies which will assist in identifying future molecular targets for GBM therapies. In chapter 4 we develop an intraoperative optical imaging technique that will assist identifying GBM and its infiltrative margins during surgical resection. The topic of this dissertation aims to target glioblastoma infiltration from molecular and cellular biology and neurosurgical disciplines. In the introduction we; 1. Provide a background of GBM and current therapies. 2. Discuss a protein we found that decreases GBM survival. 3. Describe an imaging modality we utilized for improving the quality of accrued patient GBM samples. 4. We provide an overview of intraoperative contrast agents available for neurosurgical resection of GBM, and discuss a new agent we studied for intraoperative visualization of GBM.
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Details
Title
- Evaluating and controlling glioblastoma infiltration
Contributors
- Georges, Joseph F (Author)
- Feuerstein, Burt G (Thesis advisor)
- Smith, Brian H. (Thesis advisor)
- Van Keuren-Jensen, Kendall (Committee member)
- Deviche, Pierre (Committee member)
- Bennett, Kevin (Committee member)
- Arizona State University (Publisher)
Date Created
The date the item was original created (prior to any relationship with the ASU Digital Repositories.)
2014
Subjects
Resource Type
Collections this item is in
Note
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thesisPartial requirement for: Ph.D., Arizona State University, 2014
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bibliographyIncludes bibliographical references
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Field of study: Neuroscience
Citation and reuse
Statement of Responsibility
by Joseph F. Georges