November 6, 2008
Courtesy Nature
and
World Science staff
The genome of the
cancerous tissue of an individual patient has been decoded for the first
time, identifying mutated genes with a likely a role in development of
the cancer, researchers say.
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| Marrow cells used in the study. (Courtesy Dr. Tim Ley) |
The data came from a patient with acute myeloid leukaemia, a cancer
of white blood cells that affects around 13,000 adults yearly in the United
States alone and kills about a third.
The gene sequencing technique used in the study could be applied to other
cancers and aid the design of targeted treatments, according to the
researchers, who reported their findings in this week’s issue of the
research journal Nature.
Cancer, really a group of diseases rather than one, occurs when genetic
mutations cause cells to become abnormal and start reproducing out of
control. This leads to a sometimes deadly growth of diseased tissue.
The researchers, Elaine Mardis of the Washington University School of
Medicine in St. Louis, Mo. and colleagues, sequenced cancerous and
normal tissue from the patient and compared the two sequences, or full sets
of genetic code.
Ten mutated genes were identified, according to Mardis and colleagues.
Of these, they said, two were previously reported to be associated with
the disease; the others probably represent newfound genes involved in
the development of the illness.
“Our study establishes whole genome sequencing as an unbiased method for
discovering cancer initiating mutations in previously
unidentified genes,” the researchers wrote. The technique may be “the only
effective means for discovering all of the mutations” relevant to the
disease process, they added, noting that some of the mutations “may
respond to targeted therapies.”
http://www.world-science.net/othernews/081106_cancer.htm
