Scientists have pinpointed a telltale set of genes which appear to predict if breast cancer is going to spread to the lungs. The team from the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center say the genetic “signature” could help predict how serious the disease might be. Writing in Nature, they say their finding could help doctors offer more accurate prognoses to cancer patients. They add it might also provide a new target for breast cancer treatments. Researchers traced the genes by injecting mice with cancer cells from a patient with an aggressive and metastatic breast tumour - one which had spread. They then watched to see which cells migrated to the animals’ lungs and analysed the genetic make-up of those cells. Research was carried out on mice so that scientists could follow the biological process which caused a breast tumour to metastasise to the lung.
