# Stroma-rich and desmoplastic tumours in molecular data

Source: https://onco.cc/terms/desmoplastic-stroma-rich/  
OnCo record `desmoplastic-stroma-rich` (Term). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

Some cancers, pancreatic cancer above all, are mostly dense scar-like stroma with few tumour cells; their bulk molecular profiles are dominated by that stroma.

## Summary

The tumour microenvironment is the ecosystem of cancer cells, stromal tissue and extracellular matrix around a tumour (Wikipedia), and in desmoplastic tumours the stromal fibroblasts and matrix are the majority of the tissue. Bulk RNA, protein and methylation measurements on such samples have low purity, their mRNA-protein concordance is depressed, and expression-based subtypes can flip depending on how much stroma the biopsy caught. OnCo's desmoplasia term covers the biology; this entry covers the consequence for data.

## Fields

- Kind: Term
- Last checked: 2026-09-24
- Also known as: stroma-rich tumours; stroma-rich tumour; desmoplastic tumours; desmoplastic tumour; high stromal content
- Tags: cansim-terms

## Notes

- Listed in the CanSim terms map 1.0.0 (docs/onco/terms.json, generated 2026-09-24), CC BY 4.0, attribution: CanSim project, an open, public-data-first cancer foundation-model programme; CanSim page path /terms/stroma-rich-desmoplastic-tumours.

## Sources

- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tumor_microenvironment
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tumor_microenvironment

## Connected records

- terms: [Cancer AI vocabulary (CanSim terms map)](https://onco.cc/terms/cancer-ai-vocabulary/), [Cell composition confound (tumour versus stroma and immune cells)](https://onco.cc/terms/cell-composition-confound/), [Desmoplasia (tumour stroma)](https://onco.cc/terms/desmoplasia/), [Tumour purity](https://onco.cc/terms/tumour-purity/)
- cancers: [Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma](https://onco.cc/cancers/pancreatic/)
- pathways: [Fibroblast activation, desmoplasia & matrix stiffness](https://onco.cc/pathways/caf-activation-desmoplasia/)

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JSON: https://onco.cc/api/v1/entities/desmoplastic-stroma-rich.json