Two genes that are turned off in ovarian cancer cells could provide an early test for the illness known as the silent killer, Austrian scientists said on Tuesday.Researchers at the Medical University of Vienna have identified five genes that have very low activity in ovarian cancer. Two, called N33 and NFA6R, do not work in most cases."These two genes are turned off,” said Professor Michael Krainer, an ovarian cancer researcher at the university.Although exactly what N33 and NFA6R do is not known, Krainer and his team suspect they may be involved with the progression of ovarian cancer which kills 114,000 women worldwide each year.They suspect the genes have been turned off by a process called methylation, a form of gene inactivation, which may help identify patients with early signs of the illness.
