Scientists at the University of Liverpool have identified a new gene that causes the spread of cancer.
Professor Philip Rudland, Dr Guozheng Wang and Dr Roger Barraclough from the University’s Cancer and Polio Research Fund Laboratories have discovered an additional member of the S100 family of protein genes - S100P - that causes the spread of cancerous cells from an original tumour to other parts of the body.
If present in the primary tumour, metastagenes such as S100P trigger the rapid spread of cancerous secondary tumours to other tissues in the body via the bloodstream - a process known as metastasis. Although primary tumours can be removed surgically, secondary tumours are more difficult to control. This research has been funded by the Cancer and Polio Research Fund.
The new discovery builds on several years’ work carried out at the University to investigate the genes that cause cancerous tumours to travel to other tissues in the body. To date, three other metastasis-inducing genes have been discovered - S100A4, osteopontin, and more recently, AGR2.
Chemotherapy and radiotherapy are often the only options available to treat secondary tumours but these procedures can be problematic to the patient as they can damage other healthy tissue and do not always succeed in eradicating the cancer.