In the last years the development of microfluidic devices enabled infrared micro-spectroscopy
(IRMS) to be applicable to biological samples. In the present study this method was used to find differences
between glioma cells and glioma stem cells. The ability of glioma stem cells to initiate new tumor formation
and their resistance to therapies makes these cells one of the main reasons why the most malignant form of
glioma – glioblastoma is at present incurable. Several classic markers of glioma stem cells have been reported
but none of them is their exclusive feature. Here we present preliminary results showing that by applying
principal component analysis to IRMS data we can separate glioma stem cells and non-stem cells into two
groups proving the potential of this technique. Further experiments are ongoing.
