Cancer Treatment: Epigenetics

Every cell in your body contains the same DNA, whether a cell looks and behaves like a skin cell, brain cell, or bone cell, depends on what genes within the cells DNA are turned on or off. But when cells are constantly being damaged and replaced, overtime the on/off switches can go haywire.

Epigenetics is the science of what turns genes on and off. We know that mutations or damaged genes in our DNA can lead to cancer. We are learning that the on off switches on the genes can cause damaged cells to keep multiplying or prevent repair to damaged cells. Researchers are working on epigenetic drugs that conflict the on/off switches on our genes to change the instructions that cancer cells are following.