the immune system to eradicate microscopic cancer cells
… film at 11?
Is this another riddle?
Actually, I just thought of an interesting question vaguely related to the first post. Cancer cells reproduce at an unusually fast pace and without normal limits, but are there any types of cancer that result in the cells themselves becoming larger? I can’t imagine animal cells would be able to grow large enough to see unaided, in other words cease being microscopic, but some enlargement seems theoretically possible.
Some cells grow quite large, e.g. oocytes (egg cells). HOW BIG IS A HUMAN CELL?
Frog Oocytes can easily be seen by the naked eye.
The larges human nerve cells have axons up to 1m in length, but with a very small diameter.
It is quite common for cancerous cells to be larger than what they should be, as well as the opposite, smaller than what they should be for the tissue of origin.
Cancerous cells don’t really follow any guidelines in terms of feedback loops that control cell growth and development.
I can get behind this. Actually, all cancer cells that I know of are microscopic, but the idea is groovy.
Cancer cells themselves may not be larger than normal cells, but their nuclei generally are much bigger in relation to the cytoplasm.
I am sorry that the OP is no longer around to tell us how to eradicate microscopic cancer cells. I suspect it involved paying just $19.99, plus getting a free bottle of toxin cleanse.
I would like to cleanse my toxins; they are filthy.
Question for the OP: How was your experience working with George Clooney on The Descendants?
I wouldn’t be surprised to find that some cancers have multinucleate cells, like amoebas. Such cells can be quite large indeed, even naked-eye visible.
Yes, they can be multinucleated, but not necessarily naked-eye visible.
All of the following are signs of malignancy/present in cancer cells. Typically, the more of these features, the “worst” the tumour is. This is not always the case, though:
-
Variation in cell size- Too big or too small for what the tissue of origin should be. Or a mixture of “normal size”, “small size”, and “large size” cells, when all cells in a tissue should be homogenous and orderly and similar sized.
-
Variation in nucleus size- Similar to above.
-
Variation in nucleolar size and number- See above two.
-
Increased nuclear:cytoplasmic ratio- The nucleus is bigger than it should be in comparison with the rest of the cell
-
Increased in number of nuclei- Keep in mind some cells can normally or under some physiologic conditions be multinucleated, but multinucleation when it shouldn’t be the case is malignant.
-
Increased in replication rate- Some tissues (like some intestinal cells and skin cells) are constantly renewed, so it would not be abnormal to see some signs of replication. Others, like kidney or liver, are fairly stable. To see more replication microscopically than what the tissue should have is considered malignant. Related to this is atypical replication. Cells undergo mitosis (cell replication) in an orderly fashion. When the cells are disorganized and attempting to replicate despite chromosomal mistakes, atypical replication is noted and this is typically malignant.
This may be of interest chiefly to pedants (or pathologists), but all of the factors Karl cited (even when multiple ones are present) are not diagnostic of malignancy, whether present singly or even when most are present.
Infectious and inflammatory processes can result in extremely weird looking cells and disarranged architecture. There are “tells” for various situations but it can be extremely difficult to distinguish precancers or frank cancer from proliferative areas in non-neoplastic disorders.
Examples include certain viral infections (large nuclei, multinucleation, enormous nucleoli), inflammatory/infectious processes that result in a high proliferative (mitotic) rate and so on. Then there’s the difficulty one may encounter in distinguishing a benign tumor (such as a uterine leiomyoma) from a leiomyocarcoma (malignant). Is that tumor necrosis or simple degeneration? Are the extra mitoses significant if they’re occurring adjacent to a necrotic focus in an otherwise benign-looking tumor?
The other day I had a thyroid lobe sent to me for intraoperative (frozen section) evaluation. It contained a nodule that had multiple microscopic cellular characteristics typical of a carcinoma - but an architectural pattern suggestive of a benign neoplasm (which it turned out to be, after careful microscopic examination of permanent tissue sections).
Before jumping to a diagnosis in pathology, it often pays to ask yourself, “what lookalikes could be tricking me here? What else should I be ruling out?”.
Paranoia is generally a good thing in my job.
Which is why I mentioned absent physiologic conditions (increase mitosis and multinucleation are physiologic responses to infection), and why I mentioned before that “cancerous cells don’t really follow any guidelines in terms of feedback loops that control cell growth and development.” And even more explicitly, said “this is not always the case, though” at the beginning of the sentence. And the “to have more replication than what the tissue should have…” If the tissue is responding to infection or some normal condition, then yes, it can have more replication, and even necrosis (cell death).
Of course it is of interest to me, since I am a pathologist too, and I’d rather diagnose benign tumours or infections than condemn an animal because of a malignant neoplasm. 