This perspective article highlights the leukocyte-cancer cell hybrid theory as a mechanism for cancer metastasis. Beginning from the first proposal of the theory more than a century ago and continuing today with the first proof for this theory in a human cancer, the hybrid theory offers a unifying explanation for metastasis. In this scenario, leukocyte fusion with a cancer cell is a secondary disease superimposed upon the early tumor, giving birth to a new, malignant cell with a leukocyte-cancer cell hybrid epigenome.
Animals ; Bone Marrow Cells ; cytology ; pathology ; Cell Fusion ; Humans ; Hybrid Cells ; pathology ; Neoplasm Metastasis ; Neoplasms ; pathology ; Neoplastic Stem Cells ; pathology