• Question: How is cancer caused, and will it be possible to create a cure that could be deployed world wide ?

    Asked by Ramy to Aoife, Brian, Conor, Louise, Matthew on 10 Nov 2016. This question was also asked by 778newg36, Aoife, 938newg29.
    • Photo: Louise Mc Grath

      Louise Mc Grath answered on 10 Nov 2016:

      Hi Ramy!

      Cancer is where your normal cells lose their ability to control themselves as changes to the DNA within cells occurs. This then allows rapid and uncontrollable growth of cells which have mistakes in their DNA.
      There are a variety of causes, some are physical, chemical and biological causes. Here are a few for you to have a look at:
      1. Inherited genes, so sometimes your DNA can be faulty, and you might inherit this fault from your mum or dad.
      2. Smoking
      3. Obesity and weight
      4. Too much Ultra-violet (UV) radiation from sun exposure
      5. In some cases too much alcohol can cause it
      Other causes can be found on this website: http://www.cancerresearchuk.org/about-cancer/causes-of-cancer

      I don’t know if it possible to cure all cancers as there are over 200 different types of cancer and some of them can be tricky to beat. Research is being carried out to try and cure it, so I hope that someday they will be able to cure it.

    • Photo: Matthew Kitching

      Matthew Kitching answered on 10 Nov 2016:

      Hi Ramy,

      I think louise’s answer is really good! Damaging the DNA of cells is the main route of cancer – but why does this matter? well cancer cells are weird – they are actually immortal!

      Whaaaaaaat! I hear you say? but that makes no sense – cancer kills, how can cancer cells be immortal? Well your body is a very organised system – with lots of different types of cells patterned all across your body. To keep it that way, cells have to be able to do two things: 1) divide in an organised way 2) stop dividing and die after a given amount of time. When cells divide in an uncontrolled way – they get in the way of the healthy cells which is when they cause problems.

      the body has two systems to make sure cells divide properly. The first system tells them WHEN they are allowed to divide. There are a bunch of chemicals that act like checkpoints on a highway – stopping the cells division from progressing until everything is ready for the next step. Its called the checkpoint signalling pathway, and its mega important for controlling cell division (someone got a noble prize for discovering it). The second system is called apoptosis, which is a posh way of saying “programmed cell death” and it tells cells that are damaged or not needed anymore to die in an organised way. In cancer cells this system is broken so the cell keeps growing and dividing. DNA controls both these systems so damaging it throws the whole thing into crazy mode – and cells start dividing in an uncontrolled way.

      Sooooo because cancer cells live forever, we can use them to study in labs. There is a type of cell (we call them cell lines) called HeLa cells – and they are used a lot to study human tissues. This type of cell is called a HeLa cell after a lady called Henrietta Lacks, a lady who died of cancer in 1951 – but doctors took a sample of her cancer cells and now her cells are all over the world helping study 100’s of different ways to cure cancer!

      Hope this helps answer your question? let me know if you want to know more!

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