On 13 january, journalists learned from shenzhen polytechnic university (zhe shenzhen) that researchers such as vijay sankaran, a researcher at zhao jiawei's school of pharmacy and the united states of america's massachusetts institute of technology's brod institute, had found a completely new family risk factor for nefarious blood tumours through genetic analysis of over 460,000 patient samples from the british biological sample database. The discovery is expected to provide new ideas for potential early leukaemia screening and intervention. Research results were published in the international journal cell。
“at present, the cure for leukaemia is highly dependent on the transplantation of healthy stem blood cells. Non-relative stem cell formation usually requires very long waiting periods, which delay the patient's effective treatment。
In response, the research team envisaged that some congenital family genetic risk factors could play an important role in leukaemia-related mechanisms. “despite more complete research on the occurrence of blood tumours, such as leukaemia, and associated morbidities, in recent decades, scientists still have limited understanding of the role of genetic factors in blood tumours.”。
The development and refinement of high-throughput sequencing technology has created additional possibilities for stock genetics research. At the end of 2020, zhao jia wei et al. Used the british biological sample database to analyse genetic information on the entire genome of more than 460,000 patients and to identify genetic risk factors of high family relevance。
“this work identified a new gene — ctr9. The genetic mutation carried by the gene increases the susceptibility of blood tumours by 10 times compared to other more common genetic factors.” vijay sankaran described it。
In more than two years of validation experiments, the research team found that there was a significant increase in human stem blood cells in the long and short term when the ctr9 part was missing; when ctr9 was completely missing, human stem cells could not maintain stable behaviour in the long term。
Zhao jia wei told journalists that they would go further in exploring mechanisms to stabilize stem blood cells and to convert stem blood cells to leukaemia, providing more strategies and ideas for leukaemia treatment。
Technology daily
