Cancer is not one disease but a group of related diseases, caused by abnormal genes, environmental factors, and/or viral infections. Describe the basic common characteristics of cancers, including the role of anchoring junctions and proteases. What is a tumor? What is metastasis? Is cancer usually considered to be contagious? Explain.
What will be an ideal response?
Cancer results when cells begin to divide and grow and do not respond to normal controls that would limit their growth. Anchoring junctions eventually fail to keep the cancer cells together, allowing them to spread to other organs where they continue to grow uncontrolled. Some cancer cells secrete proteases that improve their ability to spread or metastasize. A tumor is a lump of cancerous cells. Cancer is usually not contagious, being caused instead by genetic mutations in an individual or exposure to environmental factors by that individual; exceptions are cancers caused by viruses, which are believed to be the minority.
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