Blood tests could one day be used to determine the likelihood of cancer spreading and growing in a patient's body, allowing for adapted and tailored treatment.
The potential breakthrough comes after seven papers have been published as part of Cancer Research UK's nine-year-long TRACERx study, which has involved over 800 patients.
Focusing on lung cancer, the third most common type of cancer in the UK, researchers identified patterns of DNA changes in patients' tumours.
The studies' authors, based out of the Francis Crick Institute and University College London, found ways to use these patterns to indicate what a cancer might do next.
They uncovered specific mutations that could warn that cancer was more likely to come back after treatment or could spread in the body.
The mutations and changes can be monitored through blood tests, allowing doctors to pick up on early signs that cancer may return or is not responding to treatment. While they focused on lung cancer, researchers believe the technique could work for other cancers as well.
Lead researcher based at the Francis Crick Institute and Cancer Research UK’s Chief Clinician, Professor Charles Swanton, said: "TRACERx recognises that cancer is not static and the way we treat patients shouldn’t be either."
He went on: "By looking at the tumour in its entirety, we can observe how these cell populations interact and even compete with one another, which is helping us to glean valuable insights into the likelihood that a tumour will return and when this might happen.
"We can also observe how the tumour is likely to evolve over time, spread and respond to treatment, offering hope to millions of patients in the future."
The near decade-long project, backed by the leading cancer charity, tested genes in 421 lung cancer patients’ tumours.
Studies analysed more than 800 patients who took part in clinical trials at 13 hospital sites across the UK, and involved 250 investigators.
The whole study has received some £14 million in backing and could be a significant step towards boosting survival rates as doctors would have a better idea of a tumour's spread in real-time.
"By looking at different pieces of the same tumour, we can trace back how it developed in a particular patient," said Dr Alexander Frankell, who led one of the seven studies.
"We've done this for more than 400 cancer patients in the TRACERx study, which allowed us to spot common patterns, shedding light on how lung cancers arise in the body but also why some patients have a much worse survival than others."
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