Fruit Flies Reveals Cancer Cell Growth

Using fruit flies as a model, researchers in Spain revealed the individual steps that normal cells go through when they become cancerous and spread. Since the vast majority of genes in Drosophila melanogaster are the same in pests and humans, the researchers recommend the fruit fly offers a cheap and effective model for observing cancer at the molecular level, and expect other scientists can utilize their outcome to study the individual molecules and stages in particular cancers.

In cancer, cells split and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade near parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the body through the lymphatic scheme or bloodstream.

Cancer cells are no longer responding too many of the signals that direct cellular growth and death. These cells originate within tissues and, as they grow and divide, they diverge ever further from normalcy. Over time, these cells become more and more opposed to to the controls that maintain normal tissue. As a result, they divide more quickly than their progenitors and become less dependent on signals from other cells. 

Drosophila larvae show that when the actin-capping proteins are inactive, there is overgrowth of tissue in the area that will become the adult wing. This growth is reminiscent of cancer formation. The researchers dissected the different steps in the process that lead to anomalous growth. 

Cytoskeleton needs to be very strongly regulated within the cell, to stop abnormal growth in the larvae. Since Hippo is also turned on in the adult and in mammals, these findings provide insights into how this procedure may be manipulated in human cells, with a view to preventing tumor formation.