Simplified model of immunotherapy for glioblastoma multiforme: cancer stem cells hypothesis perspective

TL;DR

This paper simplifies a mathematical model of glioblastoma immunotherapy focusing on cancer stem cells, analyzing how treatment levels affect tumor stability and recurrence potential.

Contribution

It introduces a simplified version of an existing model that emphasizes cancer stem cell dynamics in GBM immunotherapy.

Findings

Simplified model identifies conditions for tumor stability.

Analysis shows impact of treatment levels on cancer recurrence.

Model suggests potential strategies for effective immunotherapy.

Abstract

Despite ongoing efforts in cancer research, a fully effective treatment for glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) is still unknown. Since adoptive cell transfer immunotherapy is one of the potential cure candidates, efforts have been made to assess its effectiveness using mathematical modeling. In this paper, we consider a model of GBM immunotherapy proposed by Abernathy and Burke (2016), which also takes into account the dynamics of cancer stem cells, i.e., the type of cancer cells that are hypothesized to be largely responsible for cancer recurrence. We modify the initial ODE system by applying simplifying assumptions and analyze the existence and stability of steady states of the obtained simplified model depending on the treatment levels.