Subventricular zone microenvironment protects glioblastoma cells from radiotherapy cytotoxicity: role of the chemokine CXCL12

Glioblastoma (GBM) is the most aggressive primary glial tumor in adults and, notwithstanding all the novel treatment approaches to date developed, the outcome remains frustrating poor (1). Indeed, in most cases GBM rapidly relapses also after aggressive multimodal therapy (surgical resection, followed by radiotherapy with concomitant and adjuvant chemotherapy with temozolomide), and the limited benefit of the available treatments at relapse are not able to improve GBM patients’ median overall survival (OS) beyond 15 months (2).