PATH 300 Lecture Notes - Lecture 21: Immunotherapy, Natural Killer Cell, Trastuzumab

• School: McGill University
• Department: Pathology
• Course: PATH 300
• Professor: Edith Zorychta

Document Summary

At first, there is only one cell being expressed to initiating and promoting chemicals. As it accumulates mutations, it starts to become a detectable tumor. In contrast, tumor cells are clonal you will see a clone of tumor cells surrounded by normal mosaic tissue. Stem cells can subdivide into different lineages, making different types of cells. If they become malignant, you can have a monoclonal tumor (all cells are the same). If it progresses further, you can get subdivisions it starts off as monoclonal, and then you get c1, C2, c3 and each group of cells will be slightly different. Cancer cells are genetically unstable and will keep accumulating more mutations. It takes 30 doublings to detect the smallest clinically significant mass: from there, it only takes 10 more doublings before you are dead. Tumors may have antigens (i. e. , altered self-peptides, abnormal proteins, hyperexpression of normal proteins) that can be recognized by the immune system.