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Tumour survey unearths wealth of mutants

Cataloguing cancer genes may pay dividends.

A hunt through thousands of human genes has turned up nearly 200 that are altered in breast and colon cancer. These genes might be useful for diagnosing cancer or as new targets for drugs.

Read the story here.

Posted by Nicola Jones on September 7, 2006 07:03 PM |

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The finding that no two tumors are exactly alike raises the question as to the value of statistics and clinical trials in oncology. There may be no absolutes any more and the idea of tailored treatment for individual cancers may be not quite as futuristic as thought.
As an oncologist in clinical research, I think that Stephen Elledge should perhaps consider the cost of the Atlas against the costs of the number of clinical trials being conducted into cancer research in a "blinded" fashion. Which of the two is like to be the more valuable to any particular cancer patient whose benefit is, after all the ultimate goal of all the research conducted into cancer.

Posted by: Peter Cheverton | September 8, 2006 09:00 AM

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