Hello flow-ers, On Fri, 31 Oct 1997 14:56:41 Kevin G Waddick wrote: > > > As a public service, I will relate to the group that this new, > mysterious word that has popped up on Halloween, namely "oncosis," > is just the familiar necrosis wearing a mask. The title "The > pathways of cell death: oncosis, apoptosis, and necrosis" is > misleading because oncosis=necrosis, as necrosis has long been > understood and defined by people in the know. The persons who came > up with "oncosis" apparently thought the term "necrosis" is too > confusing because people couldn't distinguish this pathway of > accidental cell death from "secondary necrosis" as a downstream > stage of programmed cell death (i.e.,apoptosis) unless there are two > distinct words used. I came to this conclusion by doing a > literature search and reading all of the abstracts containing the > word "oncosis." I guess some people like to make up words, even > though, in this case, it is unnecessary and causes confusion, rather > than alleviates it. > As a pathologist, please let me add my two cents. I beg to differ. Oncosis does make a few things clear. Necrosis is the morphologic result of cell death. A dead cell can not necessarily be identified morphologically as "necrotic" even though it has already passed that mysterious "point of no return" (which can be detected in some instances biochemically). Apoptosis can also result in the morphology of a "necrotic" cell. Therefore, necrosis describes a morphology, but not a process, as apoptosis does. Oncosis helps us in that respect in that it is meant to describe a process leading to cell death. The classic example given is ischemic necrosis where there is cell swelling, failure of ion pumps, swelling of mitochondria with Ca++ accumulation, etc. As for oncosis being a "made up word", von Recklinghausen coined this word in 1910, 4 years before apoptosis was coined. I would highly recommend, as others have on this discussion list, reading the AJP article "Apoptosis, Oncosis, and Necrosis" in the 1995 Vol 146 issue, pp 3-15. This article makes the argument much more articulately than myself and delineates the origins and uses of the words in this area (interestingly karyorrhexis, one of the classic forms of "necrosis" that I was taught about in my pathology classes, is really apoptosis). Also, the review in 1997 Tox Path, pp 82-88 makes the same argument. Again, please read the full articles (esp AJP) as the argument does not easily arise from the abstract. I also was very skeptical of the use of the word oncosis when I first saw the articles in AJP, etc. But after some consideration, I do think there is a valid argument for its use. I believe that given a few years (maybe even a decade or two) that oncosis will be more frequently used in our lexicon. Our ideas about necrosis and apoptosis are well ingrained, and it will take some time for adjustment to the concept of oncosis. I may have opened another can of worms, but often that can be fun. Ken Schafer kschafer@itri-1.lrri.org Kenneth A. Schafer, DVM Diplomate, American College of Veterinary Pathologists Lovelace Respiratory Research Institute Albuquerque, NM 87185 505-845-1126
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