Cell Cycle and Cancer

Cancer basically is:

• Well controlled cell growth
• Regulated cell death
• Unchecked cell growth
• the result of the loss of mutations in cells

For cancer cells to grow they must be able to:

• stay confined to the initial tissue they started in
• Leave alone cell junctions all together
• Only get into localized tissues because they can't enter the bloodstream
• penetrate the normal barriers of the body so they can enter the bloodstream or lymph vessels

Cells can become cancerous when:

• mutations accumulate in the genes that control cell division
• no mutations occur
• cell division repressor genes are not mutated
• apoptosis occurs all the time

Tags

NGSS.HS-LS3-2

In general, cancer cells contain:

• only one mutation
• 1,000's of mutations
• in the neighborhood of 60 mutations
• no mutations at all making them out of control

A mutation is:

• a cell that has no changes
• a cell that is missing its nucleus therefore it is out of control
• a cell with no ribosomes
• a change in that occurs in the DNA of a gene in a cell

Cells can become cancerous when changes (mutations) occur within:

• cell division suppressor genes
• cell division regulator genes 
• mutations in cell growth genes
• all can be causes for cells to become cancerous

Apoptosis is:

• what we call it when cancer spreads
• Pre-programmed normal cell death
• out of control cell death
• another name for cancer causing mutations

Cancer cells have:

• a growth advantage over normal cells
• really aren't different structurally from normal cells
• always spread throughout the body
• are restricted in terms of their cell division

During the early stages of cancer, tumors are:

• giant and easy to detect
• benign meaning localized
• malignant
• caused by cells without any mutations

Invasive cancer cells allow a cancer to:

• stay localized
• stay small
• be easily removed
• metastacize (spread)