Epigenetic Changes Alone Can Cause Cancer

A research team including scientists from the CNRS has discovered that cancer, one of the leading causes of death worldwide, can be caused entirely by epigenetic changes, in other words, changes that contribute to how gene expression is regulated, and partly explain why, despite an identical genome, an individual develops very different cells (neurons, skin cells, etc.). While studies have already described the influence of these processes in the development of cancer, this is the first time that scientists have demonstrated that genetic mutations are not essential for the onset of the disease. This discovery forces us to reconsider the theory that, for more than 30 years, has assumed that cancers are predominantly genetic diseases caused necessarily by DNA mutations that accumulate at the genome level.

Reference: Parreno V, Loubiere V, Schuettengruber B, et al. Transient loss of Polycomb components induces an epigenetic cancer fate. Nature. 2024. doi: 10.1038/s41586-024-07328-w

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