Slowly, Cancer Genes Tender Their Secrets

December 26, 2005 | Source: New York Times

Scientists are now finding that untangling the genetics of cancer is not impossible and are basing new treatments on their findings.

The turning point came only recently: with microarrays, or gene chips that can be coated with all known human genes, scientists can now discover every gene that is active in a cancer cell and learn what portions of the genes are amplified or deleted.

With another method, called RNA interference, investigators can turn off any gene and see what happens to a cell. And new methods of DNA sequencing make it feasible to start asking what changes have taken place in what gene.