cancer-+angier+article-+rebecca

1.The article begins by mentioning two important people with cancer. Who is Elizabeth Edwards? Who is Tony Snow? (Include their politcal party, job, and current health status-this article was written in April-your answer should have more than what you can find in the article) Elizabeth isa 57 year old woman that is the wife of presidential canidate John Edwards.She had cancer that spread from her breast to bone. Tony is a 51 year man that was the press secretary for President Bush. He had cancer that was in his colon and liver. Elizabeth had cancer, and then it went away. LAter it came back. There were sopts on her rips nad on her hip bone. She told people that cancer is not surable, but it is treatable. Tony had cancer in his colon. He had his colon removed. His cancer also spread. The doctors investigated the abnormal growth of his cancer too.

2.What is a metastatic cancer cell? Metastatic cancer remains one of the grimmest conditions a person can face. It is cancer that spread throughout the body.

Why does the author call cancer cells barbarians and cannibals? Theya re barbarians, the colonist cells, co-opting all nutrients in theur adopted organs and starving their normal neighbors of air, sugar, and salts and blocking traffic and clogging conduits, and finally when their greed exceeds their easy grab, tearing open surrounding cells and feasting like cannibals on the meat of their fellows.

What do we know about the events that transform a normal cell to a cancer cell? Cell devide and gives rise to a primary tumor. Genetic mutations and chromosomal aberrations that prompt cells to think they are being stimulated bu growth hormones whne they are not. Singals keep the cell division in check.

Why is harder to study metastatic cancer cells? They are moving throughbout the body all the time. They are very hard to see, and you have to look at them under a microscope. We can see some with the eye, but those might be the only ones we see without the microscope. we could only count them on one hand, that is because you can only see a very select few.

How many cells do primary tumors shed each day (in a rodent)? Yet how many metastatic tumors do these rodents have? The rodent shed about a milion cells each day. The rodent only has a handful of visable metastatic tumors that we can actually see and count.

Describe two ways metastatic cells can travel through the body avoiding detection from our immune system. Metastatic cells are very small and have a size of bacterial dimensions, and this is the case because of the unnecessary hanks of their cytoplasm. They can attach themeselves to the red blood cell surface and be escourted 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?) Oases might be wound sites to wich the chaperone platelets handily stick, enabling their companion cancer cells to gain their first toehold in virgin terrain. Then it begins 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? The dormant micrometastasis is when the cell dies out or lapse into dormancy. Peolple can live with thousands or millions of these dormant micrometastases without suffering and interact with their neighbors enough to exploit them. They become alive or active again. There are many cancers, such as breast tumors that come alive again and use the body's resources to to gather calcium ions.

What evidence do we have that metastasis occurs in organs that are similar to the organ of the primary tumor? Give two examples. breast tumors, are known to metastasize to bone tissue, where the invasive cells perversely take advantage to their ability to gather calcium ions for breat milk and apply it to rampant dissolution of calcium rich bones. Malignant melanocytes that give rise to melanoma both arise from the same class of cells during gestation.

sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Edwards

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_snow