Chemical approaches to targeting drug resistance in cancer stem cells

Cancer stem cells (CSCs) are a subpopulation of cancer cells with high clonogenic capacity and ability to reform parental tumours upon transplantation. Resistance to therapy has been shown for several types of CSC and, therefore, they have been proposed as the cause of tumour relapse. Consequently, much effort has been made to design molecules that can target CSCs specifically and sensitize them to therapy. In this review, we summarize the mechanisms underlying CSC resistance, the potential biological targets to overcome resistance and the chemical compounds showing activity against different types of CSC. The chemical compounds discussed here have been divided according to their origin: natural, natural-derived and synthetic compounds.