People who develop cancer are often victims of a "perfect storm" of damage to their cells and organs, British researchers reported last night.
A major research project shows that damage to stem cells is a key factor in the development of cancer. This could come from random mutations, accumulated with age, or external damage.
But researchers found that local DNA damage to organs often enables damaged stem cells to trigger cancer.
They say this local damage, often the result of environmental factors, such as tobacco, "wakes up" stem cells.
The study also found that stem cells in adults are much more vulnerable to mutating than are those in children.
Researchers at Cambridge University, UK, and the St Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Memphis, Tennessee, USA, reported their findings in the journal Cell.
Researcher Professor Richard Gilbertson brought the project from Tennessee to Cambridge.
He said: “We can now say that cancer most likely starts in stem cells but is not just down to bad luck. The development of cancer involves a perfect storm of stem cells containing DNA mistakes that are replicating in response to damage or wear and tear.
“Although stem cells can sometimes go wrong by chance, our research shows that things in our environment that lead to more DNA mistakes or that damage organs, causing these stem cells to divide, increases the chances of the ‘perfect storm’ brewing. That’s why behaviours like smoking or UV exposure raise the risk of developing cancer.
“Our work also shows why some types of cancer are more common than others, with tumours more likely to develop in organs with lots of replicating stem cells, for example the bowel.
“We hope finding out more about the way in which cancer develops will help us, and other scientists around the world, develop new ways to prevent and treat cancer.”
He added: “An argument has raged across the scientific community for some years now. Some say cancer is bad luck because mutations arise by chance in stem cells, while others argue environmental carcinogens are more important.
"This disagreement has arisen largely from the use of different mathematical models to look at existing human cancer and stem cell data, from which it is extremely difficult to tease out the impact of individual factors. Therefore, we tested these opinions in actual experimental models that looked at the individual components that might drive cancer.”
Liqin Zhu, et al. Multi-organ mapping of cancer risk. Cell 25 August 2016; doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2016.07.045 [abstract]
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