Mutational heterogeneity in cancer and the search for new cancer-associated genes.

ABSTRACT: Major international projects are underway that are aimed at creating a comprehensive catalogue of all the genes responsible for the initiation and progression of cancer. These studies involve the sequencing of matched tumour-normal samples followed by mathematical analysis to identify those genes in which mutations occur more frequently than expected by random chance. Here we describe a fundamental problem with cancer genome studies: as the sample size increases, the list of putatively significant genes produced by current analytical methods burgeons into the hundreds. The list includes many implausible genes (such as those encoding olfactory receptors and the muscle protein titin), suggesting extensive false-positive findings that overshadow true driver events. We show that this problem s

SUBMITTER: Lawrence MS 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3919509 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature