Cancer is a complex set of diseases and only thanks to
advances in genomic techniques have researchers begun to understand, at a
cellular and molecular level, the mechanisms which are disrupted in cancer
cells, a prerequisite for developing effective strategies to treat these
diseases.
One clear example of this is breast cancer. It has long been
known that hormones such as oestrogen and progesterone encourage the
proliferation of cancer cells. Because of this, one of the most common
treatments is the administration of hormone receptor blockers. The block,
however, affects all the cells of the body not only the cancer cells, and
causes a number of side effects in patients. Additionally, most cancers develop
resistance after a time and continue to grow despite anti-hormone therapy. To
treat these patients it is necessary to understand the mechanisms that trigger
the proliferation, which will allow their direct inhibition.