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Use of Publication Dynamics to Distinguish Cancer Genes and Bystander Genes

de Magalhães has shown recently that most human genes have several papers in PubMed mentioning cancer, leading the author to suggest that every gene is associated with cancer, a conclusion that contradicts the widely held view that cancer is driven by a limited number of cancer genes, whereas the ma...

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Autores principales: Bányai, László, Trexler, Mária, Patthy, László
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9315931/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35885888
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/genes13071105
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author Bányai, László
Trexler, Mária
Patthy, László
author_facet Bányai, László
Trexler, Mária
Patthy, László
author_sort Bányai, László
collection PubMed
description de Magalhães has shown recently that most human genes have several papers in PubMed mentioning cancer, leading the author to suggest that every gene is associated with cancer, a conclusion that contradicts the widely held view that cancer is driven by a limited number of cancer genes, whereas the majority of genes are just bystanders in carcinogenesis. We have analyzed PubMed to decide whether publication metrics supports the distinction of bystander genes and cancer genes. The dynamics of publications on known cancer genes followed a similar pattern: seminal discoveries triggered a burst of cancer-related publications that validated and expanded the discovery, resulting in a rise both in the number and proportion of cancer-related publications on that gene. The dynamics of publications on bystander genes was markedly different. Although there is a slow but continuous time-dependent rise in the proportion of papers mentioning cancer, this phenomenon just reflects the increasing publication bias that favors cancer research. Despite this bias, the proportion of cancer papers on bystander genes remains low. Here, we show that the distinctive publication dynamics of cancer genes and bystander genes may be used for the identification of cancer genes.
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spelling pubmed-93159312022-07-27 Use of Publication Dynamics to Distinguish Cancer Genes and Bystander Genes Bányai, László Trexler, Mária Patthy, László Genes (Basel) Article de Magalhães has shown recently that most human genes have several papers in PubMed mentioning cancer, leading the author to suggest that every gene is associated with cancer, a conclusion that contradicts the widely held view that cancer is driven by a limited number of cancer genes, whereas the majority of genes are just bystanders in carcinogenesis. We have analyzed PubMed to decide whether publication metrics supports the distinction of bystander genes and cancer genes. The dynamics of publications on known cancer genes followed a similar pattern: seminal discoveries triggered a burst of cancer-related publications that validated and expanded the discovery, resulting in a rise both in the number and proportion of cancer-related publications on that gene. The dynamics of publications on bystander genes was markedly different. Although there is a slow but continuous time-dependent rise in the proportion of papers mentioning cancer, this phenomenon just reflects the increasing publication bias that favors cancer research. Despite this bias, the proportion of cancer papers on bystander genes remains low. Here, we show that the distinctive publication dynamics of cancer genes and bystander genes may be used for the identification of cancer genes. MDPI 2022-06-21 /pmc/articles/PMC9315931/ /pubmed/35885888 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/genes13071105 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Bányai, László
Trexler, Mária
Patthy, László
Use of Publication Dynamics to Distinguish Cancer Genes and Bystander Genes
title Use of Publication Dynamics to Distinguish Cancer Genes and Bystander Genes
title_full Use of Publication Dynamics to Distinguish Cancer Genes and Bystander Genes
title_fullStr Use of Publication Dynamics to Distinguish Cancer Genes and Bystander Genes
title_full_unstemmed Use of Publication Dynamics to Distinguish Cancer Genes and Bystander Genes
title_short Use of Publication Dynamics to Distinguish Cancer Genes and Bystander Genes
title_sort use of publication dynamics to distinguish cancer genes and bystander genes
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9315931/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35885888
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/genes13071105
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