Chemical change may provide cancer prognosis:
This article was originally published in Clinica
Executive Summary
Measuring the degree of a chemical change in tumour DNA may help predict the severity of the cancer, according to a US study published in Cancer Research (October 1). Normal cells methylate DNA to switch genes off. Researchers at Ohio State University tested 47 breast tissue samples and found that cancerous tissue had much higher levels of methylation on certain gene sites than normal tissue. The findings also suggested that the degree of methylation might correlate with the seriousness of the tumour. The team is now working to compare methylation patterns in leukaemia, ovarian and lung cancer with disease severity.