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A Journey through Cancer
By Muffet Dolar Villegas
March 23,2008
They Found the Ringleader!

We don’t want cancer to come back. This is the unanimous cry of all those who have been diagnosed with breast cancer and all other cancers. I have known people who have survived breast cancer for more than twenty years. Yet most of these survivors are plagued by the thought, “What if one day the Big C comes back?” What if it comes back with a vengeance? The fear of it is normal, but fear can paralyze us and takes away all the joy of living the remaining days, months or years.
The breast cancer gene “ring leader” has been found! According to the latest study and research on breast cancer which was published last March 12 this year by WebMD Medical news.
“The Breast cancer gene in question, called SATB1, bosses other breast cancer genes and hushes anticancer genes.” Said Melinda Hill, in her article “Breast Cancer Gene Ringleader Found.”

The prime suspect gene SATB1 triggers other cancer genes to spread throughout the body. This can lead to new developments in breast cancer treatment, Hill explained.

This particular gene may not only be active in advanced breast cancer but also in early stage breast tumors before it spreads from the breast to other lymph nodes. However, these findings came from laboratory experiment on test tubes and mice, and further studies should be done more on people.

Meanwhile, in another source, Reuters Health reports also said that SATB1 is crucial to the development of the immune system but can also reprograms the expression of more than 1000 genes to fuel cancer growth.

According to scientists, breast cancer cells need this kind of gene to become metastatic, a stage when the cancer cells invades other pars of the body.

So what is SATB1? This gene, is actually a protein which is a genome organizer, a component needed to develop our warrior T-cells, to fight infection.
This peculiar gene is expressed in breast cancer cells, and when it does, it coordinates the invasion process.
The researchers of this study which appeared last March 13,2008 edition of Nature
Included Hye –Jung han, PhD, and Terumi Kohwi-Shigematsu PhP, of the the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory at the University of California Berkeley.
While more people are diagnosed with all kinds of cancer, scientists, researchers are also doing their jobs to lengthen or save more lives.