The role of secreted cellular factors after DNA damage in the development of senescence and the treatment of cancer

Visser, N (2016) The role of secreted cellular factors after DNA damage in the development of senescence and the treatment of cancer. Bachelor's Thesis, Biology.

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Abstract

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), cancer is the leading cause of death worldwide. When DNA damage is not repaired, this will lead to lesions which can cause cancer. The DNA damage response (DDR) is a complex mechanism which includes DNA repair systems and checkpoints which detect the lesions. If a lesion is detected, than this mechanism will secrete signals which activates DNA repair. An important mechanism to permanently prevent proliferation in damaged cells is called cellular senescence. A major characteristic of cancer is that these cells proliferate unrestrained. If a therapeutic agent could induce cellular senescence in tumor cells than this could potentially be used to treat cancer. Furthermore, the microenvironment of tumors could be a good target for a treatment, in order to prevent tumor metastasis and tumor growth. Hereby, a successful strategy is to target non-tumor cells and the factors they secrete in the microenvironment of the tumor. Cellular senescence arise by the critical minimal length of the telomeres. 90% of the tumor cell have a telomerase activity which increases risk for developing cancer. Another option to treat cancer could be targeting of the telomerase. Understanding the role of factors secreted by cells after DNA damage, the development of cellular senescence and targeting tumor telomerase are topics which have potential for curing cancer. In this thesis, I will investigate the role of factors secreted by cells after DNA damage and the development of cellular senescence, induction of which may be a potential therapeutic target. Therefore the research question of this thesis is: Do factors secreted by cells after DNA damage and the development of cellular senescence potentially lead to a cancer treatment?

Item Type:	Thesis (Bachelor's Thesis)
Degree programme:	Biology
Thesis type:	Bachelor's Thesis
Language:	English
Date Deposited:	15 Feb 2018 08:12
Last Modified:	15 Feb 2018 08:12
URI:	https://fse.studenttheses.ub.rug.nl/id/eprint/13872

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