Molecular switch reverses cancerous transformation at the critical moment of transition

Professor Kwang-Hyun Cho’s research team of the Department of Bio and Brain Engineering at KAIST has captured the critical transition phenomenon at the moment when normal cells change into cancer cells and analyzed it to discover a molecular switch hidden in the genetic network that can revert cancer cells back into normal cells.

The team’s findings are published in the journal Advanced Science.

A critical transition is a phenomenon in which a sudden change in state occurs at a specific point in time, like water changing into steam at 100℃. This critical transition phenomenon also occurs in the process in which normal cells change into cancer cells at a specific point in time due to the accumulation of genetic and epigenetic changes.

The research team discovered that normal cells can enter an unstable critical transition state where normal cells and cancer cells coexist just before they change into cancer cells during tumorigenesis, the production or development of tumors, and analyzed this critical transition state using a systems biology method to develop a cancer reversal molecular switch discovery technology that can reverse the cancer process.

They then applied this to colon cancer cells and confirmed through molecular cell experiments that cancer cells can recover the characteristics of normal cells.

This is a source technology that automatically infers a computer model of the genetic network that controls the critical transition of cancer development from single-cell RNA sequencing data, and systematically finds molecular switches for cancer reversibility by analyzing the simulation. It is expected that this technology will be applied to the development of reversible treatments for other cancers in the future.

Professor Cho said, “We have discovered a molecular switch that can revert the fate of cancer cells back to a normal state by capturing the moment of critical transition right before normal cells are changed into an irreversible cancerous state.

“In particular, this study has revealed in detail, at the genetic network level, what changes occur within cells behind the process of cancer development, which has been considered a mystery until now. This is the first study to reveal that an important clue that can revert the fate of tumorigenesis is hidden at this very moment of change.”