The potential role of apoptosis (programmed cell death) in a chaotic determined carcinogenesis.
The proposed hypothesis may interpret apoptosis as a dynamic parameter by means of chaos theory. Regular tissue renewal is determined by the quantity of mitosis and cell death (mainly apoptosis). These two components are describable as so-called 'limit cycle attractor' representing a reference cycle of the tissue system. If tissue kinetics remain within these limits, the system stays in a homeostatic equilibrium. Disruptive factors such as genetic alterations may have the ability to destabilize this homeostasis and induce the quasiperiodic development which represents one way in which a system becomes chaotic. The inhibition of apoptosis prevents the elimination of mutation-affected cells which leads to an uncoordinated proliferation of a mutated cell clone. Thus, this clone represents an independent oscillator which effects a new attractor: it is called 'torus' attractor. Additional perturbations induce the chaotic 'strange attractor': the system is bound to shift into chaos, morphologically detectable as cancer.
Sedivy
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Clinical Institute of Clinical Pathology, University of Vienna Medical School, Austria.
D000818:Animals; D017209:Apoptosis; D002460:Cell Line; D002471:Cell Transformation, Neoplastic; D006706:Homeostasis; D006801:Humans; D008954:Models, Biological; D016296:Mutagenesis; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000503:physiopathology*; D017711:Nonlinear Dynamics; D011230:Precancerous Conditions / Q000503:physiopathology