Investigation of the relationship between cannibalism and dormancy in coculture of human dental pulp-derived mesenchymal stem cells (DPSCS) and human breast cancer (MCF7) stem cells

Cancer is a global disease with an increasing incidence each year, and recently ranked first among the causes of death according to cancer statistics around the world. When cancer-related deaths are examined, breast cancer is the second most common type of cancer after lung cancer for women. The aim of this thesis is to investigate dormancy and cannibalism in cocultured breast cancer stem cells and mesencymal stem cells. Cell cannibalism means when one cell eats another cell alive, this is also called abnormal phagocytosis. Dormancy is the process that the cells remain silent but not to lose their function. The microenvironment of the cancer cell is related to dormancy, so it may directly effective with its signals. Mesenchymal stem cells are effective in both tumor progression and tumor suppression. Therefore, the full explanation of the behavior of modulation of mesenchymal stem cells in cancer cells; It is very important both for new treatment methods and for solving clinical problems in the use of mesenchymal stem cells today. In this study, we aim to determine whether the dormancy process of cannibalism behavior has an effect on breast cancer stem cells by using mesenchymal stem cells from dental pulp stem cells.