Why Do Young People Get Cancer?

Overview

Journal Pediatr Blood Cancer

Specialties Hematology
Oncology
Pediatrics

Date 2020 May 12

PMID 32391946

Citations 13

Authors

Alex Kentsis

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Oncologists and cancer biologists are frequently confronted by the question of what causes cancer? This is particularly vexing for cancers affecting children and young adults who have had limited exposure to environmental mutagens and the effects of aging. Here, I focus on a general framework of the causes of early-onset cancer development in children and young adults by relating inherited and constitutional cancer predisposition, oncogenic pathogens, and developmental mutations. This framework has implications not only for mechanistic investigation of young cancers, but should also clarify improved strategies for their treatment, screening, and potential prevention.

Citing Articles

Assessment of the Impact of Trace Essential Metals on Cancer Development.

Gorska A, Markiewicz-Gospodarek A, Trubalski M, Zerebiec M, Poleszak J, Markiewicz R Int J Mol Sci. 2024; 25(13).

PMID: 38999951 PMC: 11241304. DOI: 10.3390/ijms25136842.

Geographic Disparities in Cancer Incidence in the US Population Aged 20 to 49 Years, 2016-2020.

DuBois T, Henry K, Siegel S, Lynch S Prev Chronic Dis. 2024; 21:E32.

PMID: 38723272 PMC: 11086694. DOI: 10.5888/pcd21.230335.

Simultaneous Occurrence of Multiple Neoplasms in Children with Cancer Predisposition Syndromes: Collaborating with Abnormal Genes.

Telman G, Strauss E, Sosnowska-Sienkiewicz P, Halasz M, Januszkiewicz-Lewandowska D Genes (Basel). 2023; 14(9).

PMID: 37761810 PMC: 10530991. DOI: 10.3390/genes14091670.

Exploring Nanocarriers as Treatment Modalities for Skin Cancer.

Adnan M, Akhter M, Afzal O, Altamimi A, Ahmad I, Alossaimi M Molecules. 2023; 28(15).

PMID: 37570875 PMC: 10421083. DOI: 10.3390/molecules28155905.

The anti-cancer effect and mechanism of animal scale-derived extract on malignant melanoma cells.

Song L, Li C, Yu J, Yang Y, Tian X, Choo S Sci Rep. 2023; 13(1):12548.

PMID: 37532809 PMC: 10397295. DOI: 10.1038/s41598-023-39742-x.

References

Papaemmanuil E, Rapado I, Li Y, Potter N, Wedge D, Tubio J . RAG-mediated recombination is the predominant driver of oncogenic rearrangement in ETV6-RUNX1 acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Nat Genet. 2014; 46(2):116-25. PMC: 3960636. DOI: 10.1038/ng.2874. View

Greaves M . A causal mechanism for childhood acute lymphoblastic leukaemia. Nat Rev Cancer. 2018; 18(8):471-484. PMC: 6986894. DOI: 10.1038/s41568-018-0015-6. View

Hornsby C, Page K, Tomlinson I . What can we learn from the population incidence of cancer? Armitage and Doll revisited. Lancet Oncol. 2007; 8(11):1030-8. DOI: 10.1016/S1470-2045(07)70343-1. View

Mullighan C, Phillips L, Su X, Ma J, Miller C, Shurtleff S . Genomic analysis of the clonal origins of relapsed acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Science. 2008; 322(5906):1377-80. PMC: 2746051. DOI: 10.1126/science.1164266. View

Rooney M, Shukla S, Wu C, Getz G, Hacohen N . Molecular and genetic properties of tumors associated with local immune cytolytic activity. Cell. 2015; 160(1-2):48-61. PMC: 4856474. DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2014.12.033. View

Malkin D, Nichols K, Schiffman J, Plon S, Brodeur G . The Future of Surveillance in the Context of Cancer Predisposition: Through the Murky Looking Glass. Clin Cancer Res. 2017; 23(21):e133-e137. PMC: 7336256. DOI: 10.1158/1078-0432.CCR-17-2026. View

Henssen A, Kentsis A . Emerging functions of DNA transposases and oncogenic mutators in childhood cancer development. JCI Insight. 2018; 3(20). PMC: 6237467. DOI: 10.1172/jci.insight.123172. View

Kentsis A, Frank S . Developmental Mutators and Early Onset Cancer. Front Pediatr. 2020; 8:189. PMC: 7198762. DOI: 10.3389/fped.2020.00189. View

Mandelker D, Zhang L, Kemel Y, Stadler Z, Joseph V, Zehir A . Mutation Detection in Patients With Advanced Cancer by Universal Sequencing of Cancer-Related Genes in Tumor and Normal DNA vs Guideline-Based Germline Testing. JAMA. 2017; 318(9):825-835. PMC: 5611881. DOI: 10.1001/jama.2017.11137. View

10.

Ripperger T, Bielack S, Borkhardt A, Brecht I, Burkhardt B, Calaminus G . Childhood cancer predisposition syndromes-A concise review and recommendations by the Cancer Predisposition Working Group of the Society for Pediatric Oncology and Hematology. Am J Med Genet A. 2017; 173(4):1017-1037. DOI: 10.1002/ajmg.a.38142. View

11.

Pendleton M, Lindsey Jr R, Felix C, Grimwade D, Osheroff N . Topoisomerase II and leukemia. Ann N Y Acad Sci. 2014; 1310:98-110. PMC: 3961513. DOI: 10.1111/nyas.12358. View

12.

Tomasetti C, Vogelstein B . Cancer etiology. Variation in cancer risk among tissues can be explained by the number of stem cell divisions. Science. 2015; 347(6217):78-81. PMC: 4446723. DOI: 10.1126/science.1260825. View

13.

ODriscoll M . Diseases associated with defective responses to DNA damage. Cold Spring Harb Perspect Biol. 2012; 4(12). PMC: 3504433. DOI: 10.1101/cshperspect.a012773. View

14.

Henssen A, Koche R, Zhuang J, Jiang E, Reed C, Eisenberg A . PGBD5 promotes site-specific oncogenic mutations in human tumors. Nat Genet. 2017; 49(7):1005-1014. PMC: 5489359. DOI: 10.1038/ng.3866. View

15.

Swaminathan S, Klemm L, Park E, Papaemmanuil E, Ford A, Kweon S . Mechanisms of clonal evolution in childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia. Nat Immunol. 2015; 16(7):766-774. PMC: 4475638. DOI: 10.1038/ni.3160. View

16.

Henssen A, Henaff E, Jiang E, Eisenberg A, Carson J, Villasante C . Genomic DNA transposition induced by human PGBD5. Elife. 2015; 4. PMC: 4625184. DOI: 10.7554/eLife.10565. View

17.

Keijzers G, Bakula D, Scheibye-Knudsen M . Monogenic Diseases of DNA Repair. N Engl J Med. 2017; 377(19):1868-1876. DOI: 10.1056/NEJMra1703366. View

18.

Zhang J, Walsh M, Wu G, Edmonson M, Gruber T, Easton J . Germline Mutations in Predisposition Genes in Pediatric Cancer. N Engl J Med. 2015; 373(24):2336-2346. PMC: 4734119. DOI: 10.1056/NEJMoa1508054. View

19.

Bullman S, Pedamallu C, Sicinska E, Clancy T, Zhang X, Cai D . Analysis of persistence and antibiotic response in colorectal cancer. Science. 2017; 358(6369):1443-1448. PMC: 5823247. DOI: 10.1126/science.aal5240. View

20.

Ballinger M, Goode D, Ray-Coquard I, James P, Mitchell G, Niedermayr E . Monogenic and polygenic determinants of sarcoma risk: an international genetic study. Lancet Oncol. 2016; 17(9):1261-71. DOI: 10.1016/S1470-2045(16)30147-4. View