Multinucleated Cells in Fibrosarcoma Exhibit Self-Renewal and Enhanced Tumorigenicity

Researchers isolated these multinucleated giant cells using nylon meshes of different sizes. They then assessed the tumorigenic potential of individual giant cells by grafting them under the skin of athymic nude mice. Remarkably, a single grafted giant cell was sufficient to induce the development of both orthotopic and metastatic tumors in this murine fibrosarcoma model, highlighting their significant role in tumor development.

Weihua et al. investigated multinucleated cells in the UV-2257 murine fibrosarcoma cell line. They observed through live cell imaging that single mononuclear cells can become multinucleated due to failed cytokinesis. Furthermore, a single multinucleated giant cell can proliferate into four new multinucleated giant cells within one cell division cycle. These giant cells displayed increased resistance to doxorubicin compared to mononuclear cells and exhibited self-renewal capabilities, forming colonies in hard agar, indicating anchorage-independent growth.