Researchers have potentially found a way to enhance the effectiveness of leukaemia treatments after discovering that cancer cells ' epigenome – their genetic character – changes when they make themselves into other types of cells to escape drug therapies , a process called transdifferentiation . The team said if epigenetic changes were identified and blocked , the cancer cells could not escape drug treatments by avoiding transdifferentiation , potentially making an anti - tumour treatment more efficient . If epigenetic changes by cancer cells were blocked , leukaemia patients could not select the right strategy to escape from the anti - tumour effect of the drug and therapies could be more effective .
Researchers have potentially found a way to enhance the effectiveness of leukaemia treatments after discovering that cancer cells' epigenome – their genetic character – changes when they make themselves into other types of cells to escape drug therapies, a process called transdifferentiation. The team said if epigenetic changes were identified and blocked, the cancer cells could not escape drug treatments by using transdifferentiation, potentially making an anti-tumour therapy more efficient. If epigenetic changes by cancer cells were blocked, leukaemia cells could not select the transdifferentiation strategy to escape from the anti-tumour effect of the drug and therapies would be more effective.