Cancer Biology 101

Explore cancer types from carcinoma, sarcoma, melanoma, lymphoma, and leukemia, to hematologic cancers; distinguish benign from malignant tumors and note lung cancer as a leading cause of death from cancer.

Explore how age, tobacco, overweight, diet, alcohol, and sun exposure shape cancer risk, with modifiable factors and occupational and infectious agents like asbestos and EBV.

Describe how cancer initiates from DNA mutations and other changes that disrupt normal cell growth, causing hyperproliferation and tumor formation, and involve proto-oncogenes, tumor suppressor genes, and DNA repair genes.

Cancer cells achieve unregulated growth by acquiring six hallmark capabilities: self-sufficient growth, evading growth suppressors, activating tissue invasion and metastasis, enabling replicative immortality, inducing angiogenesis, and resisting cell death.

Explore current cancer treatment strategies, including surgery, radiation therapy, chemotherapy, immunotherapy, targeted therapy, and stem cell transplantation, and explain how surgery removes or debulks early-stage solid tumors to ease symptoms.

Radiation therapy uses high-dose radiation to damage cancer cell DNA, killing or shrinking tumors by stopping their growth, with external beam and internal beam options often combined with other treatments.

Chemotherapy uses toxic agents to kill fast-growing cancer cells throughout the body, potentially making tumors smaller before surgery or radiation therapy, with neoadjuvant or adjuvant use and side effects.

Immunotherapy uses the immune system to fight cancer by boosting activity or attacking cancer cells with antibodies and vaccines, with side effects such as skin reactions or flu-like symptoms.

Restore blood-forming stem cells after cancer therapy by injecting healthy cells through a vein; they travel to bone marrow, replace destroyed cells, and help eliminate cancer cells from bloodstream.

Explore precision medicine as a customizable approach using tumor genetic analysis to tailor drug combinations for individual patients, noting genetic changes vary and genetic testing's role.

Trace the evolution of cancer treatment from surgical tumor removal and anesthesia to chemotherapy, radiation, targeted therapies like imatinib and rituximab, and immunotherapies, aided by genetics and rapid genome sequencing.

Cancer survival is improving as death rates fall due to prevention, screening, and better treatment. Tobacco remains the largest avoidable risk, and early diagnosis through screening boosts five-year survival.