Catch of the day for cancer researchers.Glowing zebrafish, like this one, may provide insight into the spread of human leukemia leukemia (l  kē`mēə), cancerous disorder of the blood-forming tissues (bone marrow, lymphatics, liver, spleen) characterized by excessive production of immature or mature and other cancers in which a gene called MYC promotes cell growth. Researchers fused the mouse version of MYC to a gene encoding a fluorescent-green protein and inserted the combination into zebrafish DNA DNA: see nucleic acid. DNA or deoxyribonucleic acid One of two types of nucleic acid (the other is RNA); a complex organic compound found in all living cells and many viruses. It is the chemical substance of genes. . They injected this DNA into embryos to create lines of fish in which the gene is active in some immune cells. The resulting cancerous cells, which arise in the thymus thymus Pyramid-shaped lymphoid organ (see lymphoid tissue) between the breastbone and the heart. Starting at puberty, it shrinks slowly. It has no lymphatic vessels draining into it and does not filter lymph; instead, stem cells in its outer cortex develop into and migrate initially to the gills and eyes, glow brightly in the transparent fish. A. Thomas Look of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston and his colleagues, who describe their work in the Feb. 7 Science, plan to introduce mutations into such fish to identify genes that speed or slow the spread of MYC-driven cancer cells cells once believed to be peculiar to cancers, but now know to be epithelial cells differing in no respect from those found elsewhere in the body, and distinguished only by peculiarity of location and grouping. See also: Cancer . |
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