Question

New study suggests--------------
Transfer of mitochondrial DNA from healthy cells to tumour cells!!!

Answer 1

Say what ?

Answer 2

O_O

Answer 3

Cloning extinct animals ! :D

Answer 4

this happens naturally...wait let me attach the paper

Answer 5

That awesome!! Imagine the wolly mammoth coming back :D

Answer 6

No, the tasmanian tiger ! And dodo birds ! And DINOSAURS

Answer 7

this is the original paper

Answer 8

I don't understand any of that, but I'll give you a medal. :D

Answer 9

see the paper then u will understand....its not actually cloning extinct animals..:)

Answer 10

wait i am also trying to attach an article in simple language

Answer 11

http://www.sciencealert.com/wandering-mitochondrial-dna-hint-at-new-ways-to-fight-disease

Answer 12

@pooja195

What about cloning neanderthals ? lol

Answer 13

thats awesome so one day caner wont exist right? Micro dissection will replace the defective gene which will eventually remove the tumor because it will be replaced with healthy cells? Right?
@Conqueror how bout cloning me :P

Answer 14

It's really possible to stop 'cancer' ? I just hear that people give tons of money for cancer research but it doesn't really do anything

Answer 15

It's a genetic mutation. :P So it's probably never going to happen to us but like 1 in a million people. You have a better chance of beating cancer. Or did I read wrong?

Answer 16

we can never stop cancer as such...because there are million reasons why cancer can occur...and also there are so many types of cancers, and every type of cancer cell behaves differently...it is mainly due to our lifestyle, in general accumulation of mutation due to evolution, addictive habits like smoking and stuff, it can happen due to any reason....so if there are million reasons....we need million raised to million solutions for it....which is very very hard

Answer 17

"In this study, it was suggested that if the mtDNA mutational hotspots detected in tumor cells were common in human populations, the mechanism for their generation should be identical. Therefore, the mtDNA mutations were excluded as the pathogenic factor for tumorigenesis. Following compilation and analysis of the data from previous studies, Vega et al revealed that the majority of the reported tumor-associated mtDNA alterations were common human polymorphisms and mutational hotspots. In conclusion, the authors postulated that the mtDNA mutations in tumor cells were hitchhike mutations and did not play a role in tumorgenesis."

Source --> http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3499590/ <---

Answer 18

stoping cancer cells is tough which is why we chose to kill those cells
sometimes we do get outbreak of cancer in us but its detected by immune system & killed right away
in other words our immune system is able to kill those cancer cells
but due to their number & rate of division - our immune system cant match the speed which is why tumor is formed.
for a cancer to occur
there are different mechanisms
error during mitosis
error in transcription factors
errors in signaling
abnormalities in DNA
mutations
inheritance
and many many more

which is why we better be careful
with food we take in
with medications we take in
with surrounded condition (UV light from sun for example)
because cancer can outbreak any minute in us
& luckily immune system gets rid of them on time
which is why strengthening your immune system would help u avoid tumor outbreak

other problems of cancer
they can happen anywhere
& the problem here us that - detecting method for different regions tends to be slightly different
sometimes tests can be done but tumor undetected while its there
sometimes early stages of tumor are tough to detect & only late ones can be detected - which is u are lucky- chances are u can survive for longer (if damage is not extreme) or u r late.
the other problem is types of cancer
specially metastasis
ones cancer reaches this stage
it gets tough
because its not anymore cancer in one region but now its cancer literally traveling around your body, & causing cancer in other sites
depending on fatality level
u may have good chances of survival
or next to no chances

funny part is that
we tend to not believe that miracles are real thing
but sometimes we can see it happen in medical world
yet cant really explain sometimes
i guess we can call those patients as... lucky? or so :)

Answer 19

If one can guarantee that a cell can maintain an absolute 100% fidelity of replication (DNA), which results to an absolute 100% regenerative ability then maybe just maybe cancer may be "stopped." But now, think what would be the repercussion of these conditions.

Answer 20

100% fidelity = 0% chance of evolution

Answer 21

low chances of survival too

Answer 22

Even 100% fidelity would not stop cancers. There are epigenetic factors that could cause issues as well.

Answer 23

this paper is 20 years old. if the technique was as good as you think it is, we would do it every day by now.

Answer 24

"new study suggests"...why did I even bother reading that...

as much as I appreciate you reading scientific papers...don't abolish your criticism EVER.

Answer 25

also, the paper has nothing to do with what the article is about, for some reason. yes, they are manipulating DNA in cell culture with lasers, cool stuff. but that's chromosomal DNA. nothing to do with mitochondria, or cancer, or any other aspect of the article.

the cell paper you mentioned observed that in an mtDNA deficient cell line (!), mtDNA is transferred from healthy cells to the tumor. I don't get how this is supposed to become a cancer treatment. other diseases could profit, yes. but cancer is one of the diseases I would not suspect to be affected by this research, because mitochondrial defects generally don't cause cells to be unaffected by outside control mechanisms (a key prerequsite for cancer)

you see, CELL is interested in pointing out novel mechanisms that were previously unknown. the article, the scientist states that there are maybe many possibilities - and everybody says exactly that about his research. I mean, what kind of fool would state anything else? ^^

so please. we can discuss here a possible impact of the research, but please don't take anything seriously just because some guy says it's awesome. same goes for all the likers, by the way. don't be stupefied just because you can read an actual scientific paper for once. no offense. :-)

Answer 26

@pooja195 lol if it was as easy as u made it sound -probably
but as @Schleifspur this paper indeed is 20 year old which is why we cant fully trust it
because medical sciences change every 4 years (way of treating, testing etc changes to more updated one)
technology development which leads to more detailed findings which leads to perhaps more accurate findings
so i'd suggest you check the new findings as they are atm more reliable as compared to old ones
+ imagine doing what you said, the transfer is not like each sec or something + number of cancer cells in tumor is over a million if not billion
so can u really wait? + as u expect the transfer to happen, at that time cancer cells keep dividing
+ if it was possible to deal with it this way - immune system itself would get rid of cancer cells
but it cant
why?
because number of cells and speed of division is way too much for immune system to catch up

Answer 27

btw i dont mean to completely ignore it, but just be aware that mechanism used in the paper & findings might change (more developed, more info found if not corrected)

Answer 28

The paper is more a technique paper, and as stated by others, really has nothing to do with what the OP stated. Though three parent embryos are now legal in the UK, which is somewhat related (very distantly).

Answer 29

understand the nature of cancer cells before making statement of facts about them

Answer 30

I recently read an article, using in vitro fertilization using mitochondrial DNA, to have women birth multiple children.

Answer 31

at the same time.

Answer 32

So, twins, essentially.

Answer 33

@thadyoung I think you misread the article. Recently, the UK authorized so-called "three-parent" childred. The why and what:

Why? Diseases caused by mitochondria are some of the worst genetic diseases there are. Mitochondria are only passed via the maternal line. This means that every cell in all of our bodies have mitochondria that comes only from the mother. Because of this, mutations in the mitochondria genome accumulate in families without any way to purge them from sexual reproduction.

What (or how): In order to remove these negative effects, the mitochondria must be replaced. Because the mitochondria has essentially no known gene or genes that result in altered appearance, personality, etc, the mitochondria are some what disposable. What happens is this: a male and female fertilize and egg, now a zygote, outside of the body. Doctors then take that zygote and using specialized equipment, remove the mitochondria and replace it with a mitochondria from a donor female. This is done early enough that all the cells in the developing child will have the mitochondria from the donor.

That is how there are three parent children.

Answer 34

Oh yeah! That's what it was. I read it like a month ago. Thanks for that clarification.

Answer 35

you're welcome