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Hello. My name is Mark Arends. I'm the Professor of Pathology at the University of Edinburgh and today, I'm giving a lecture on the pathogenesis of neoplasia.
0:13
The learning outcomes for this lecture are to learn about what are the genetic changes driving tumour progression. Focusing on both oncogenes and tumour suppressor genes as the two major classes of genetic changes. Followed by, how does genetic instability occur and the role of abnormalities of DNA repair, and then how do cancers invade and metastasise?
0:42
Starting with oncogenes, we can start with the question, what genes are targeted for mutation in cancer? These are the genes that regulate cell proliferation, cell death and the signalling within cells, to and from cells, and the matrix. These genes are involved in monitoring and maintaining genetic stability and genomic integrity. They're also genes involved in regulating and maintaining tissue architecture including cell movement and cell adhesion. In cancer, the two major classes of gene that are altered are firstly, the oncogenes and secondly, the tumour suppressor genes.
1:25
What are oncogenes? Oncogenes are essentially a class of normal genes and if one of the alleles is mutated, they are said to act in a dominant or positive gain-of-function fashion in contributing to the development of a tumour. Typically, mutations affect only one allele of the pair of alleles of an oncogene. And as I mentioned, these are not special cancer genes, but these are normal genes that have a normal role in growth control and they can be activated in several ways.

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