Now Perceiving: The Complete Genome Package

Abstract

The genetic basis of cancer has expanded from studying individual gene and molecules to using a systems biology approach in deciphering the onset and development of the disease. The biology of the disease has revealed itself to be more complex than the initial ‘Hallmarks of cancer’ as defined by Hanahan and Weinberg in 2000, wherein the activation of proliferation, metastasis and angiogenesis along with signs of resistance to death and evasion of tumor suppressors, co-exist. Since then a large body of work has elucidated the role of immune cells, inflammation and metabolism within the tumor to be an equal contributing in the genesis and progression of this heterogeneous disease. Cells and molecules in the stroma together comprise the tumor microenvironment and these are known to activate signaling cascades, which help in tumor growth and progression. Cancer development itself has changed its fate as and when new discoveries of tumor suppressor genes, oncogenes and cell types have been validated. The concept of a linear progression of cancer has been significantly altered by the discovery of regulatory molecules, which modulate the driver and passenger mutation in a cell.