Hope raised of a better prostate cancer test

A CELL that could be the "mother" of all prostate tumours has been identified by scientists.

Samples of the "basal" cells taken from healthy human prostate tissue triggered cancer in mice with suppressed immune systems.

The finding suggests that these cells may be the true culprits behind the disease which kills about 10,000 men a year in the UK.

Previously it was thought that a different type of immature cell, known as a luminal cell, lay at the root of prostate cancer.

Experts hope the discovery, reported yesterday in the journal Science, will lead to better diagnostic tools and more effective treatments for the disease.

Dr Owen Witte, from the University of California at Los Angeles, one of the study's senior authors, said: "Certainly the dominant thought is that human prostate cancer arose from the luminal cells because the cancers had more features resembling luminal cells.

"But we were able to start with a basal cell and induce human prostate cancer and now this gives us a place to look in understanding the sequence of genetic events that initiates prostate cancer . . . helping us to potentially uncover new targets for therapy."

One lesson from the research was that cancer studies based solely on "malignant" cells can be misleading, said the scientists.

Co-author Andrew Goldstein, a UCLA research student, said: "We know those cells are malignant, but we don't know how they got there.

"By starting with healthy cells and turning them into cancer, we can study the cancer development process. If we understand where the cancer comes from, we may be able to develop better predictive and diagnostic tools."

Each year around 35,000 men are diagnosed with prostate cancer in the UK.