Cancer_up_in_here_shelbyfeelsgreatonmy_lips

The article begins by mentioning two important people with cancer. Who is Elizabeth Edwards? Who is Tony Snow? (This article was written 03/07/07. As a part of this question find out what has happened in the year and a half since this article was written with respect to the cancer of Ms. Edwards and Mr. Snow. Include a link to your sources.) What is a metastatic cancer cell? It is when the cancer jumps into another thing like bones to marrow or colon to liver Why does the author call cancer cells barbarians and cannibals? Because they jump around and eat everything including other cells What do we know about the events that transform a normal cell to a cancer cell? Biologists know quite a bit about the steps that transform a normal cell into a cancer cell, a cell that lawlessly divides and gives rise to a primary tumor. They have identified genetic mutations and chromosomal aberrations that prompt cells to think they are being stimulated by growth hormones when they are not, that stifle safety signals meant to keep cell division in check, and that shore up the tips of chromosomes and so immortalize cells that otherwise would be slated to die. Why is harder to study metastatic cancer cells? Because they don’t stay still and they run around the body like in your blood. Others take on what Dr. Weinberg calls “hitchhikers,” attracting an entourage of platelets and red blood cells to their surface “to escort them through the rapids into safe pools within tissues.” How many cells do primary tumors shed each day (in a rodent)? Yet how many metastatic tumors do these rodents have? In experiments with mice carrying bulky tumors of a billion cells each, perhaps a million cancer cells are seeded into the rodents’ circulation each day, “yet the visible metastases formed in such animals may be counted on the fingers of one hand.” Describe two ways metastatic cells can travel through the body avoiding detection from our immune system. To survive the journey, malignant cells must reinvent themselves as parasites. A few manage to slim down to almost bacterial dimensions by pinching off unnecessary hanks of their cytoplasm. Others take on what Dr. Weinberg calls “hitchhikers,” attracting an entourage of platelets and red blood cells to their surface “to escort them through the rapids into safe pools within tissues.” Where is the first site (oasis for the cancer cell) that metastasis generally occurs? Why? Why is it an oasis? (What is an oasis?)

Such oases might be wound sites to which the chaperone platelets handily stick, enabling their companion cancer cells to gain their first toehold in virgin terrain — and to begin feeding on the rich broth of growth hormones and factors with which wound sites typically teem.

What is a dormant micrometastasis? Why are they relevant to human health? Yet even after malignant cells have settled onto a new site, their replicative success is hardly guaranteed. Most appear to either die or lapse into dormancy. Patients may harbor thousands or millions of these dormant micrometastases without suffering a fatal relapse of the disease. Evidence suggests that micrometastases will not attain macro dimensions unless, among other things, they adapt to their new surroundings and interact with their neighbors enough to exploit them. What evidence do we have that metastasis occurs in organs that are similar to the organ of the primary tumor? Give two examples.

Find a current (published in last 2 months) news article (from a national source) about cancer. Post a link to the article and write a 75-100 word summary.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/articles/m/metastasis.htm

This article is about metastasis, it tells how dangerous cancer is not just because of the original tumor, but also because of hidden dangers within it. Cancer can break off parts of its tumor for them only to be carted around in the body by the blood stream or something else and for them to be deposited elsewhere in the body. This is how other tissues can be subjected to it, they turn into hitchhikers or microscopic size to travel around only to be deposited somewhere dangerous.