[Prostate cancer stem cells: Current understanding]

Prostate cancer is the most common malignancy in men and seriously harms their health. The current theories on prostate cancer cannot fully explain the heterogeneity, metastatic growth, drug resistance and tumor recurrence of the disease. Prostate stem cells are small heterogeneous subpopulations in the prostate that are characterized by self-renewal and proliferation, and can produce all the lineages of prostate epithelia. According to the cancer stem cell hypothesis, prostate cancer may be a stem cell disease. Prostate cancer stem cells have a markedly increased clonogenicity and therapeutic resistance, and play a decisive role in the occurrence and development of prostatic malignancies. Therapeutic strategies for selectively targeting these stem cells have attracted widespread attention. This article focuses on the origin, identification, molecular markers and clinical application of prostate cancer stem cells, their physiological function and possible involvement in the pathogenesis of prostate cancer, paving a theoretical ground for the development of efficient and sophisticated therapeutic strategies.