They rebuild the evolution of cancer and predict their evolution

An international team led by the Clinic-IDIBAPS (Institute of Biomedical Research in Barcelona) and the London Cancer Research Institute has developed a new method based on the DNA methylation that It allows to rebuild the evolution of cancer and anticipate its progression clinic.

Posted in the magazine Naturethe study analyzes the Evolution of tumors in 2,000 patients with different types of leukemia and lymphomasapplying the algorithm developed, called Evofluxaccording to the researchers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtfufv2yrrc

The work has been coordinated by the Chief of Biomedical Epigenomics of IDIBAPS and researcher of the Catalan Institution of Advanced Research and Studies (ICREA), Iñaki Martín-Subero; and the director of the Evolution and Cancer Center of the London Cancer Research Institute, Trevor Graham. The first authors are Felum Gabbutt and Martí Duran-Ferrer; and other researchers from Sweden, Switzerland and the United States have collaborated. In total, they have participated 21 researchers from 15 institutions in five countries.

In the study the team indicates that cancer does not begin at the time of diagnosis, but “often It develops silently for years“. Martín-Subero explained that the evolution of the secret history of cancer is recorded in the epigenomaspecifically in a type of epigenetic brand known as fluctuating methylation: “We like to call it, in a metaphorical way, as The black cancer box“

“Yeah We decipher the past We can know whether (cancer) grew a long time ago or recently and if it grew quickly or not, “he explains. He says that in the case of chronic lymphatic leukemia, a cancer that is not treated immediately, can be predicted years in advance what will be the time when the tumor will progress.

Investigation

Through advanced mathematical models, work has achieved decipher methylation patternsrebuilding both the origin and the evolution of the tumor with an “unprecedented” precision, which also allows predicting the future progress of the disease.

Gabbutt says that They resumed epigenetic data old from a completely new perspective; And Duran-Ferrer adds: “What we previously considered background noise, now revealed The evolutionary history of cancer“

For its part, Martín-Subero explains that with this methodology they can predict and help the doctor to know in a concrete patient cancer “When will it probably require treatment“, and adds that clinical management can be controlled based on knowing future evolution.

Predict the future trajectory

From access to anonymized medical records, researchers could correlate the past evolution of the tumor with its aggressiveness: “Cancers change over time, which complicates their treatment,” says Trevor Graham.

Thus, they discovered that The initial growth of cancer determines how it will evolve in the futurewhich allows to predict how the disease will progress in each patient, and Martín-Subero points out that this methodology, although it had to adapt a little, “could work with all types of cancer“

Support

The study, conducted within the framework of the Clinic Barcelona Comprehensive Cancer Center -Centro promoted by the Hospital Clínic, Idibaps and UB-, has had the support of the Spanish Association against Cancer (AECC), the Cancer Research UK Foundation, the La Caixa Foundation, the European Research Council and the Health Institutes of the United States.

The president of the AECC Barcelona, ​​Laureano Molins, has defended that this finding “allows us to move towards a more personalized medicine and give response to needs“, as well as the important impact on improving the quality of life of patients.