Tumor progression can now be mapped less to mathematical standards and more to individual patients according to a new study by researchers at Harvard and Johns Hopkins Universities. The study, publishing in PLoS Computational Biology on November 9, 2007, provides a new paradigm in calculating tumor development, showing that it appears to be driven by mutations in many genes.Our understanding of the progression of cancer has long been based on streamlined models where cancer is driven by mutations in only a few genes. Niko Beerenwinkel et al. show how tumor progression can be driven by hundreds of genes. As many as 20 different mutated genes might be responsible for driving an individual tumor’s development.
