Challenging the standard model of cancer
New atavistic model shows role of ancient genes in the spread of cancer
2021-05-20
(Press-News.org) In spite of decades of research, cancer remains an enigma. Conventional wisdom holds that cancer is driven by random mutations that create aberrant cells that run amok in the body.
In a new paper published this week in the journal BioEssays, Arizona and Australian researchers challenge this model by proposing that cancer is a type of genetic throwback, that progresses via a series of reversions to ancestral forms of life. In contrast with the conventional model, the distinctive capabilities of cancer cells are not primarily generated by mutations, the researchers claim, but are pre-existent and latent in normal cells.
Regents' Professor Paul Davies, director of Arizona State University's Beyond Center for Fundamental Concepts in Science and Kimberly Bussey, cancer geneticist and bioinformatician from the Precision Medicine Program at Midwestern University, Glendale, Ariz., teamed up with Charles Lineweaver and Anneke Blackburn at the Australian National University (ANU) in Canberra to refine what they call the Serial Atavism Model (SAM) of cancer. This model suggests that cancer occurs through multiple steps that resurrect ancient cellular functions.
Such functions are retained by evolution for specific purposes such as embryo development and wound healing, and are usually turned off in the adult form of complex organisms. But they can be turned back on if something compromises the organism's regulatory controls. It is the resulting resurrection steps, or atavistic reversions, that are mostly responsible for the ability of cancer cells to survive, proliferate, resist therapy and metastasize, the researchers said.
Davies and Bussey are also members of ASU's Arizona Cancer Evolution Center (ACE) which seeks to understand cancer, not just in humans, but across all complex species, in the light of evolutionary processes.
"Cancer research has been transformed in recent years by comparing genetic sequences across thousands of species to determine gene ages," Davies said. Just as geologists can date rock strata, so geneticists can date genes, a technique known as phylostratigraphy.
"The atavistic model predicts that the genes needed for cancer's abilities are mostly ancient - in some cases little changed over billions of years," Davies added.
Lineweaver explained, "In biology, nothing makes sense except in the light of evolution, and in the case of cancer nothing makes sense except in the light of the deep evolutionary changes that occurred as we became multicellular organisms."
"The atavistic model of cancer has gained increasing traction around the world," added Bussey. "In part, this is because it makes many predictions that can be tested by phylostratigraphy, unlike the conventional somatic mutation theory."
Blackburn, a cancer biologist in ANU's John Curtin School of Medical Research, agreed.
"Appreciation of the importance of gene ages is growing among oncologists and cancer biologists," she said. "Now we need to use this insight to develop novel therapeutic strategies. A better understanding of cancer can lead to better therapeutic outcomes."
INFORMATION:
Skip Derra, ASU Media Relations, (480) 965-4823; skip.derra@asu.edu
For interviews:
Associate Professor Charley Lineweaver
Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics and Research School of Earth Sciences, ANU
T: +61 2 6125 6717 or +61 2 6125 0822
M: +61 457 550 577
E: charley.lineweaver@anu.edu.au
Associate Professor Anneke Blackburn
John Curtin School of Medical Research, ANU
T: +61 405 067 200
anneke.blackburn@anu.edu.au
Professor Paul Davies
Beyond Center, Arizona State University
Tempe, Arizona T: +61 2 6125 5172
E: Paul.Davies@asu.edu
Kimberly Bussey
Precision Medicine Program
Midwestern University
Glendale Arizona,
+1 623-537-6598
kbusse@midwestern.edu
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
2021-05-20
Protective immune memory--through B cells, which make antibodies, and/or T cells, which in the case of CD8+ T cells can kill virus-infected cells--can be induced by identical but also by related viruses. Related to the COVID-19 virus SARS-CoV-2, there are four common cold coronaviruses (CCCoVs) that together cause ~20% of common cold infections: OC43, HKU1, 229E, and NL63. Most adults have been infected with CCCoVs multiple times in their lives. Whether or not meaningful CCCoV-induced anti-SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibodies exist remains a matter of debate. Meanwhile, the generation of T cell memory should depend ...
2021-05-20
Syracuse, N.Y. - The COVID-19 death rate for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) is higher than the general population in several states across the U.S., according to a new study published in Disability and Health Journal.
The research team that conducted the study analyzed data from 12 U.S. jurisdictions: Arizona, California, Connecticut, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, New Jersey, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Washington and Washington, D.C.
The death rates were higher in all jurisdictions for those with IDD who live in congregate settings such as residential group homes. The results for ...
2021-05-20
RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C. -- A new study by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), the USDA's Agricultural Research Service (USDA-ARS) and RTI International (RTI) projects that global chronic and hidden hunger will increase the overall years of life lost due to premature mortality and years lived with disability, also known as disability-adjusted life years (DALYs), globally by over 30 million by 2050 relative to 2010. Expected impacts of climate change on the availability and access to nutritious food will exacerbate this change in DALYs by almost 10 percent.
Researchers published the findings in an article in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, ...
2021-05-20
Data will support BLA filing for afamitresgene autoleucel next year -
Responses observed across a broad range of antigen expression -
Initial safety and durability are encouraging -
PHILADELPHIA, PA., and OXFORDSHIRE, U.K., May 20, 2021 -- Adaptimmune Therapeutics plc (Nasdaq:ADAP), a leader in cell therapy to treat cancer, will report initial data from its Phase 2 SPEARHEAD-1 trial, with afamitresgene autoleucel (afami-cel, formerly ADP-A2M4), at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) congress. Full abstracts were released online today. Data will be presented in an oral presentation by Dr. Sandra D'Angelo of the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (Abstract #11504) on June 4th.
"Patients are seeing substantial ...
2021-05-20
Normally, mountain forests are among the most diverse habitats in alpine regions. Yet, as a team from the Alfred Wegener Institute discovered in the Tibetan Plateau, the higher, treeless areas are home to far more species. Their findings, which were just published in the journal Nature Communications, can help to predict how the biodiversity of alpine regions will decline in response to global warming - when the mountain forests spread to higher elevations.
As anyone who has ever hiked in the mountains knows, the landscape changes with the elevation. At first, for a long time, you trek uphill through forests, until they open up into the first meadows and pastures, where a wide range of plant species bloom in the spring. Farther up, the landscape becomes more barren. ...
2021-05-20
Planned missions to return humans to the Moon need to hurry up to avoid hitting one of the busiest periods for extreme space weather, according to scientists conducting the most in-depth ever look at solar storm timing.
Scientists at the University of Reading studied 150 years of space weather data to investigate patterns in the timing of the most extreme events, which can be extremely dangerous to astronauts and satellites, and even disrupt power grids if they arrive at Earth.
The researchers found for the first time that extreme space weather events are more likely to occur early in even-numbered solar cycles, and late in odd-numbered cycles - such as the one just starting. They are also ...
2021-05-20
A new paper in JNCI Cancer Spectrum, published by Oxford University Press, indicates that several non-genetic factors--including greater red meat intake, lower educational attainment, and heavier alcohol use--are associated with an increase in colorectal cancer in people under 50.
In the United States, incidence rates of early-onset colorectal cancer have nearly doubled between 1992 and 2013 (from 8.6 to 13.1 per 100,000), with most of this increase due to early-onset cancers of the rectum. Approximately 1 in 10 diagnoses of colorectal cancer in this country occur in people under 50.
Researchers ...
2021-05-20
Philadelphia, May 20, 2021 - Research has shown empathy gives healthcare workers the ability to provide appropriate supports and make fewer mistakes. This helps increase patient satisfaction and enhance patient outcomes, resulting in better overall care. In an upcoming issue of the END ...
2021-05-20
A newly developed tool will allow scientists to better gauge how centuries of fossil fuel emissions could be skewing the data they collect from marine environments.
Researchers at the University of Alaska Fairbanks led the effort, which created a way for marine scientists to factor into their results the vast amounts of anthropogenic carbon dioxide that are being absorbed by oceans. Those human-caused carbon sources can muddy research results -- a problem known as the Suess effect -- leading to flawed conclusions about the health and productivity of marine ecosystems.
"The ...
2021-05-20
Oncotarget published "Analytic validation and clinical utilization of the comprehensive genomic profiling test, GEM ExTra®" which reported that the authors developed and analytically validated a comprehensive genomic profiling assay, GEM ExTra, for patients with advanced solid tumors that uses Next Generation Sequencing to characterize whole exomes employing a paired tumor-normal subtraction methodology.
The assay detects single nucleotide variants, indels, focal copy number alterations, TERT promoter region, as well as tumor mutation burden and microsatellite instability status.
Additionally, the assay incorporates ...
LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:
[Press-News.org] Challenging the standard model of cancer
New atavistic model shows role of ancient genes in the spread of cancer