CANCER CELLS: A NEW ERA

WHAT IS CANCER:

The study of cancer is called ONCOLOGY. Cancer has been known to mankind since ancient times.

Cancer is a disease in which some of the body’s cells grow uncontrollably and spread to other part of the
body. Cancer can start almost anywhere in the human body, which is made up of trillions of cells.
Normally, human cells grow and multiply (through a process called cell division) to form new cells as the
body needs them. When cells grow old or become damaged, they die and new cells take their place.

A BRIEF HISTORY AND ORIGN OF CANCER

The disease was first called cancer by Greek physician Hippocrates (460-370). He is considered the father
of medicine. Hippocrates used the terms carcinos and carcinoma to describe non-ulcer and ulcer forming
tumors. In Greek this means crab. The description was named after the crab because the finger-like
spreading projections from a cancer to mind the shape of a crab.

Later, Roman physician, Celsus (28-50BC) translated the Greek term into cancer, the Latin word for crab.
It was Galen (130-200AD), another Roman physician, who used the term oncos(Greek for swelling) to
describe tumors. Oncos is the root word for oncology or the study of cancers.

THE 19TH CENTURY

Rudolf Virchow, often called the founder of cellular pathology, founded the basis for pathologic study of
cancers under the microscope. Virchow correlated microscopic pathology to illness.

He also developed study of tissues that were taken out after surgery. The pathologist could also tell the
surgeon whether the operation had completely removed the cancer.

HISTORY OF THE CAUSES OF CANCER

There have been numerous theories of causes of cancer throughout ages. For example, the ancient
Egyptians blamed Gods for cancers.

Hippocrates believed that the body had 4 humors (body fluids): blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black
bile. He suggested that an imbalance of these humors with an excess of black bile in various body sites
could cause cancer. This was the humoral theory.

After the humoral theory came the lymph theory. Stahl and Hoffman theorized that cancer was
composed of fermenting and degenerating lymph, varying in density, acidity, and alkalinity. John Hunter,
the Scottish surgeon from the 1700s, agreed that tumors grow from lymph constantly released from
blood.
ZacutusLusitani (1575−1642) and Nicholas Tulp (1593−1674), doctors in Holland, concluded that cancer
was contagious. Throughout the 17th and 18th centuries, some believed that cancer was contagious.

 BRAIN STORM: Before reading further, is cancer actually contagious?

Rudolph Virchow (1821−1902), suggested that all cells, including cancer cells, are derived from other
cells. He proposed the chronic irritation theory. He believed that cancer spread like a liquid. In the
1860s, German surgeon,

Karl Thiersch, showed that cancers metastasize through the spread of malignant cells and not through a
liquid.

Until 1920’s trauma was thought to be the cause of cancers.

CHAPTER 2

UNDERSTANDING THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN CANCER CELLS AND NORMAL

CELLS.

Cancer cells differs from normal cells in so many