DNA

aka deoxyribonucleic acid, double helix, genetic code, genome

The long molecule that stores the instructions for building and running a cell, written in a four-letter chemical alphabet. Cancer is fundamentally a disease of damaged DNA.

DNA is a twisted ladder of two strands whose rungs are pairs of four bases (A, T, C, G); the order of those bases encodes about 20,000 genes plus the switches that control them. Every time a cell divides it must copy all three billion letters, and copying errors, radiation, tobacco chemicals and other insults introduce mutations that accumulate over a lifetime. Sequencing a tumour's DNA reveals which genes are broken and often which drug might work; sequencing DNA fragments in blood (ctDNA) lets doctors track the tumour without a biopsy.

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Term
Deletion
Shares Chromosome, Mutation.
Term
Gene expression
Shares RNA, Gene.
Term
Protein
Shares RNA, Gene.
Term
Driver mutation
Shares Mutation, Genomic profiling.
Term
Variant of uncertain significance (VUS)
Shares Mutation, Genomic profiling.
Term
Biopsy
Shares Genomic profiling, Circulating tumour DNA (ctDNA).
Term
Biomarker
Shares Genomic profiling, Circulating tumour DNA (ctDNA).
Technology
RNA sequencing & expression profiling
Shares RNA, Next-generation sequencing (NGS), Genomic profiling.

terms

Chromosome Circulating tumour DNA (ctDNA)Gene Genomic profiling Mutation Next-generation sequencing (NGS)Nucleus Radiotherapy RNA