Low oxygen levels drive cancer

Washington  Low oxygen levels in cells, not genetic mutations, may fuel uncontrollable cancer growth, new research indicates.

If hypoxia, or low oxygen levels in cells, is proven to be a key driver of certain types of cancer, treatment plans for curing the malignant growth can change in significant ways, said Ying Xu, professor of bioinformatics and computational biology at Georgia University's Franklin College of Arts and Sciences.

The research team analysed samples of messenger RNA data, also called transcriptomic data, from seven different cancer types in a publicly available database.

They found that long-term lack of oxygen in cells may be a key driver of cancer growth, the Journal of Molecular Cell Biology reports.

Previous studies had linked low oxygen levels in cells as a contributing factor in cancer development, but not as the driving force for cancer growth.

High cancer rates worldwide cannot be explained by chance genetic mutations alone, Xu said, according to a Georgia statement.

"Cancer drugs try to get to the root, at the molecular level, of a particular mutation, but the cancer often bypasses it," Xu said.

"So we think that possibly, genetic mutations may not be the main driver of cancer."

Xu relied on the gene HIF1A as a biomarker of the amount of molecular oxygen in a cell. All seven cancers showed increasing amounts of HIF1A, indicating decreasing oxygen levels in the cancer cells.