Cancer's Hidden Code: How AI Reveals Tumors' Molecular Secrets

The framework, developed in collaboration with Ashoka University, gives a new lens to look at cancer -- not by its size or spread alone, but by its molecular personality.

"Cancer is not just a disease of growing tumours -- it is powered by a set of hidden biological programmes called the hallmarks of cancer. These hallmarks explain how healthy cells turn malignant: how they spread, evade the immune system, and resist treatment," the Ministry said.

While for decades, doctors have relied on staging systems like TNM, which describe the size and spread of tumours, they often miss the deeper molecular story. For example, why two patients with the "same" cancer stage can have very different outcomes.

The new AI framework titled OncoMark can read the molecular "mind" of cancer and predict its behaviour, the Ministry said.

The team at SN Bose, led by Dr. Shubhasis Haldar and Dr. Debayan Gupta, used OncoMark to analyse 3.1 million single cells across 14 cancer types.

S N Bose is an autonomous institute of the Department of Science and Technology (DST).

The research team created synthetic "pseudo-biopsies" that represent hallmark-driven tumour states.

This huge dataset allowed the AI to learn how hallmarks like metastasis, immune evasion, and genomic instability work together to fuel tumour growth and therapy resistance.

"OncoMark achieved over 99 per cent accuracy in internal testing and remained above 96 per cent across five independent cohorts. It was validated on 20,000 real-world patient samples from eight major datasets, showing broad applicability. For the first time, scientists could actually visualise how hallmark activity rises with advancing cancer stage," the Ministry said.

The new framework, published in the Nature journal Communications Biology, reveals which hallmarks are active in a patient's tumour. This can direct doctors toward drugs that directly target those processes.

It can also help identify aggressive cancers that might look less harmful under standard staging, supporting earlier intervention, the Ministry said.

- IANS