In many cases, cancer cells differ from healthy chromosomes - this phenomenon is called aneuploidia. It is found in 90% of malignant tumors and 75% of cancer blood diseases. Normally, in humans, their 46 collected in 23 pairs, but when the cells of the body turn into cancer, the number of structures stored inheritable information can change.
The study of the karyotype anomalies (a set of signs of chromosomal set) of cancer cells is actively carried out by the last few decades, but accompanied by great difficulties. Specialists from Tel Aviv University (Tel Aviv University) set for itself to determine how much the degree of Aneuploidy in different cases of oncology varies.
For this, they raised about thousands of different crops of cancer cells taken from patient tissues from around the world. With the help of advanced methods of bioinformatics of cultures were classified according to the degree of Aneuploidy. This not only helped better understand the variability of chromosomal anomalies in malignant formations, but also made it possible to study the differences between such cells from healthy in the part of the karyotype. Only in the XX century, biologists have the opportunity to carry out such work using powerful computers and software - the number of three hundred and three hundred analyzed signs.
It turned out that cancer cells have one important feature that distinguishes them from healthy. Yes, they share uncontrollably and make it much more often, but much more sensitive to violations of one of the stages of this process. Or rather, problems arising during the so-called control point of the cell cycle between methaphhasa and mitosis (SPINDLE ASSEMBLY CHECKPOINT, SAC). Normal cells are capable of eliminating errors that appear during SAC to a certain extent. Cancer with a high degree of Aneuploidy - cease division, even when the number of problems is minimal.
Scientists checked his hypothesis by subjected to culture of cancer cells in various drugs. In some cases, medicines, if the mechanism of their action affected the processes occurring at the control point, successfully suppressed the division of malignant cells. The authors of the study are very optimistic and further plan to move from experiments on cell cultures to working with model animals. It is necessary to check how to attack this "Achilles heel" of cancer in tissues. It is too early to speak about the development of full-fledged drugs with a similar effect, but specialized drugs are already tested, partially or completely aimed at the SAC violation.
So large-scale work would be impossible without a broad international cooperation. The initiators of the study were experts from the Laboratory of Bena David at the Medical Faculty of Sakler in Tel Aviv University. It was helped by American scientists from the Broad Institute of Mit and Harvard (Broad Institute of Mit and Harvard) and the Vermont University, German from Technical University of Kaiserslautern (TU Kaiserlautern), Italian from the European Institute of Oncology (IRCCS), as well as Netherlands Researchers from Groningen University (University Of Groningen) . In total, 26 scientists are published in the authors of the article published in the peer-reviewed journal. And, judging by the volume of work done, it is not at all the case when the "dead shower" fit for consumed effect or career.
Source: Naked Science