Reviews and PerspectivesImaging and Advanced TechnologyCellular Origin of Barrett's Esophagus: Controversy and Therapeutic Implications
Section snippets
Cellular Origin of Barrett's Metaplasia
It is estimated that between 1% and 2% of the US population has Barrett's esophagus, translating to an enormous figure of 3–4 million individuals nationwide with a heightened risk for lethal esophageal adenocarcinoma. Given the frequent acquisition of this metaplasia, it would seem a robust mechanism for its generation exists and at this point would have been well scrutinized and defined. In contrast with these expectations, the origins of Barrett's has gone through multiple renditions without
Origins of Barrett's Revisited
The weaknesses in the 3 models for the cell of origin of Barrett's esophagus and their limited predictive value signaled the need for additional models. We had previously cloned the p63 gene encoding a p53-like transcription factor and demonstrated that its expression was specific to stem cells of stratified epithelia including epidermis, esophagus, as well as mammary and prostate glands. In the functional characterization of the p63 gene, we generated p63 knockout (p63ko) mice and human
Acknowledgments
The authors thank the members of the Xian-McKeon, Crum, and Ho laboratories for helpful discussions and support. This work was supported by the National Cancer Institute and General Medical Sciences of the NIH (RO1-GM083348 and R21CA124688), the European Research Council, the Genome Institute of Singapore, and the Biomedical Research Council and the National Medical Research Council, Singapore.
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Conflicts of interest The author discloses no conflicts.