The cause of prostate cancer progression to the incurable stage has likely been uncovered in a recent study.

Researchers at the University of Oulu in Finland have discovered novel genes and mechanisms that can explain how a genomic variant in a single nucleotide polymorphism influences prostate cancer aggressiveness. Their findings also suggest ways to improve risk stratification and clinical treatment for advanced prostate cancer.

Three billion base pairs in the human genome are nearly identical between any two individuals. Nevertheless, genome sequence variation such as single nucleotide polymorphism does occur in the population and may have profound effects on an individual's risk of developing various diseases, including prostate cancer.

Academy Research Fellow Gong-Hong Wei said, "How human genomic variants cause disease and its progression is in general one of the most compelling puzzles and questions in medicine." Prostate cancer is the second most common cancer and the fifth leading cause of cancer-related death in men, with more than 1.1 million new cases diagnosed and 300,000 deaths annually worldwide. The full findings are present in the journal- Cell.