The Story of Cancer: The Film

Some years ago, at a symposium on cancer, Prof. Peter Taylor, head of the Center for Experimental Medicine of the Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Cientificas (IVIC), stated the following: The price that multicellular organisms pay for the joy of reproduce through sex, and not by boring cell division as single-celled organisms, is cancer. This witty assertion explains why only complex organisms with their trillions of cells targeted by a genetic program and control of cell division, are the only ones that can generate a malignant neoplasm. If a single-celled organism moves away from simply program shall enter into chaos and die. On the other hand when, for example, one of the numerous epithelial cells of a multicellular organism achieves to break controls, is triggering cell abnormal growth and, and by breaking the basal membrane, will come into contact with the vascular and lymphatic channels; this will allow a group of neoplastic cells to travel to other organs and systems. In that invasion, the powerful machinery of the malignancy will use all their wiles to advance. It will segregate endothelial growth factors to create its own supply and satisfy its voracious dependence of oxygen and glucose. It will enslave the neighboring normal cell to put at its service and will form a parallel structure with its own microecosystem, with unwavering autonomy and, especially, scheduled to be immortal and lethal. This is what has been called cancer from hundreds of years ago.