NIH Radio
NCI Seeks to Identify Potential Genetic Factors for Breast and Prostate Cancer
Brief Description:
The National Cancer Institute is seeking to identify potential genetic factors for breast and prostate cancer.
Transcript:
Akinso: The National Cancer Institute is seeking to identify potential genetic factors for breast and prostate cancer. Under this initiative, which is known as "Cancer Genetic Markers of Susceptibility," a total of 25-hundred samples provided by men with —and without — prostate cancer will be scanned. Previous studies have identified single gene mutations that cause cancer or that are linked to other inherited diseases. NCI Deputy Director Dr. Anna Barker says these studies have given researchers an early look at possible ways susceptibility to cancer can be passed from generation to generation. But these mutations are rare in the general population and are directly related to a small proportion of human cancer.
Barker: We know quite directly that both breast and prostate cancer are partially controlled by what we call low penetrance genes. These are genes that are inherited basically. What we've not been able to do is sort of systematically look at these diseases and determine how many of those genes there are; to what extent do they actually contribute to these diseases individually and as a group. The significance here would be that we are going to systematically look at two of our big killers in cancer — prostate cancer and breast cancer to systematically identify what we call germ-line mutations, or those mutations that are inherited from mother to offspring that will actually increase a person's risk of getting cancer in this case breast or prostate cancer.
Akinso: Dr. Barker said the project promises to provide a needed database to support the development of novel strategies for the early detection and prevention of prostate and breast cancer.
Barker: This is a project that really will set the stage for disease prevention, which is where we need to be with disease especially cancer. And these are two diseases that men and women fear most in this country and they're responsible for a lot of deaths. So if we can begin to understand how to prevent these we will actually move much more rapidly toward our goal of eliminating suffering and death from cancer in the next decade.
Akinso: Dr. Barker says the initiative is among the first large whole genome scanning projects in cancer, and she is hopeful that the results will provide promising new insights into understanding genetic risk in common cancer like breast and prostate cancer. For more information, visit http://cgems.cancer.gov. This is Wally Akinso at the National Institutes of Health Bethesda, Maryland.
About This Audio Report
Date: 3/24/2006
Reporter: Wally Akinso
Sound Bite: Dr. Anna Barker
Topic: Cancer
Institute(s): NCI
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