Tumour cells don’t live in isolation

Despite the huge progress that has been made over recent decades, more than 150,000 people lose their lives to cancer every year in the UK, usually because the disease has spread through their body.

Understanding why this happens – and how we can treat tumours once they have spread – is crucial if we are to beat cancer.

Cancer is not just one but hundreds of different diseases, depending on where in the body it started and the underlying molecular faults that drive it.

Over the years, many researchers have poured their efforts into understanding individual types of cancer -  such as the recent work from Cancer Research UK’s Professor Carlos Caldas showing that breast cancer can be divided into ten distinct types – as well as searching for the fundamental characteristics of cancer cells (for example, our very own Sir Paul Nurse and Sir Tim Hunt’s Nobel prize-winning work on understanding how all cells divide).

Much of the effort in developing new cancer treatments has focused on identifying and targeting specific molecules in cancer cells – good examples of this approach in action are revolutionary ‘targeted’ drugs like breast cancer drug trastuzumab (better known as Herceptin) and leukaemia drug imatinib (also called Glivec).

But as well as this focus on cancer cells themselves, it’s becoming increasingly clear that tumours are more than just collections of rogue cells. Blood vessels, immune cells and other healthy tissues are hijacked to support a tumour, helping it grow, spread and resist treatment.

Researchers are increasingly turning their attention to this ‘bad neighbourhood’ around a around a tumour, to understand how it can be brought back under control to treat cancer more effectively.

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