Boveri at 100: Cancer evolution, from preneoplasia to malignancy

Abstract

In the 100 years since the publication of Boveri's manuscript, 'Concerning the origin of human tumours', we have seen many advances in our understanding of how tumours originate, develop and progress. However, reading this article now, it is possible to find conclusions, or more often predictions, of what we now consider basic tenets of tumour biology. These include predicting the stochastic nature of the malignant change and that all tumours are necessarily of clonal origin, perhaps the basis of the modern concepts of field cancerization, of tumour heterogeneity and the clonal evolution of tumours. Modern researchers rarely refer to this paper, yet as a source of ideas it must rank amongst the landmarks in tumour biology of the last 100 years.