THE INFLUENCE OF GLIOMA INFILTRATION ON NEURAL SIGNALLING

Gliomas are primary brain cancers that infiltrate the brain and integrate into neural networks. Glioblastoma, a grade IV astrocytoma, is the most common and aggressive malignant brain tumour. Over the last decade, the interaction between neurons and glioma cells via the neuron-glioma synapse has been increasingly recognised to play an important role in glioma infiltration and proliferation. However, the cellular mechanisms by which glioma infiltration influences neural function and how neural activity affects tumour growth in vivo are largely unknown. In this study, two-photon calcium imaging in vivo and whole-cell patch-clamp electrophysiology were used in a glioblastoma cell line-derived xenograft mouse model to examine the influence of glioma infiltration on pyramidal neuron signalling in the primary somatosensory cortex. Simultaneous monitoring of glioma infiltration and neural calcium activity revealed increased neural signalling as glioma cells infiltrated closer towards neurons and pharmacologically dampening neural activity resulted in the slowing of glioma progression and proliferation. Collectively, these findings demonstrate that glioma modulates neural signalling in a spatially dependent manner, highlighting neural activity as a potential new therapeutic target for glioma patients.