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Getting the latest healthcare news for you
Getting the latest healthcare news for you
Researchers at KAIST have identified the molecular circuits that lock cells into abnormal states — like those seen in cancer — and developed a technology called ROOT that can reverse this process. The breakthrough could pave the way for treatments that restore diseased cells to normal rather than simply destroying them. The findings were published in PNAS.
When a cell shifts into an abnormal state — like a cancer cell invading surrounding tissue — it typically stays that way, even after the original trigger is gone. That's because of self-reinforcing molecular feedback loops inside the cell that act like a lock, keeping it stuck. Now, researchers at KAIST have figured out how to find and control that lock.
The team developed a technology called ROOT (Revelation Of the Original circuit of irreversible Transition), which maps intracellular regulatory processes as computational logic models and uses systems biology to pinpoint the exact circuits responsible for locking a cell in place — what they call the "irreversibility kernel."
From there, they proposed two control strategies: resetting control, which returns a cell to its original state while keeping the lock mechanism intact, and reversing control, which dismantles the lock entirely so cells can move freely between states. The approach was validated across multiple biological models, including lung cancer and B-cell differentiation.
Key Takeaways:
Why it matters: Most cancer treatments focus on killing abnormal cells. ROOT offers a fundamentally different approach — rewinding a cell's fate — which could open entirely new therapeutic strategies for cancer, aging, and other diseases driven by irreversible cell-state changes.
