Start/stop switch' for retroviruses found..

A researcher has discovered a previously unknown mechanism for silencing retroviruses, segments of genetic material that can lead to fatal mutations in a cell's DNA.

If ESET can be blocked, retroviruses would become dramatically more active, thus either killing the cancer cells hosting them or flagging them as targets for the immune system.

Leung, who was co-lead author with a graduate student at Kyoto University in Japan, has devoted his studies at UBC to the growing field of epigenetics -- changes to the genome that do not involve changes to the underlying genetic code. Such changes determine whether or not a gene is expressed.