Fig. 5.

Differentiation therapy. Communication between the cells and their microenvironment is essential for the maintenance of normal tissues or formation of cancers and their metastases. In cancer cells, there is disrupted regulation of cell differentiation, which leads to the exhibition of a tumor promoting phenotype. The embryonic niche or embryonic stem cell (ESC) conditioned-media can promote undifferentiated cancer stem cells (CSCs) to become differentiated, which ultimately inhibits tumor growth. After injection into an early embryo, aggressive CSCs learn to “speak the same language” of the embryonic cells and participate in embryo formation instead of tumor growth. The specific niche of the embryo can change the CSC phenotype toward specific cell lineages related to that niche