A cancer dogma states that inactivation of oncogene(s) can cause cancer remission, implying that oncogenes are the Achilles' heel of cancers. This current model of cancer has kept oncogenes firmly in focus as therapeutic targets and is in agreement with the fact that in human cancers all cancerous cells, with independence of the cellular heterogeneity existing within the tumour, carry the same oncogenic genetic lesions. However, recent studies of the interactions between an oncogene and its target cell have shown that oncogenes contribute to cancer development via developmental reprogramming of the epigenome within the target cell. These results provide the first evidence that carcinogenesis can be initiated by epigenetic stem cell reprogramming, and uncover a new role for oncogenes in the origin of cancer. Here we analyse these evidences and discuss how this vision offers new avenues for developing novel anti-cancer interventions.Research in our group is partially supported by FEDER and by MICINN (SAF2012-32810), by NIH grant (R01 CA109335-04A1), by the ARIMMORA project (FP7-ENV-2011, European Union Seventh Framework Program), by Junta de Castilla y Leon (BIO/SA06/13), and by the Deutsche José Carreras Leukämie-Stiftung
(DJCLS project 13/26). All Spanish funding is co-sponsored by the European Union FEDER program. ISG is an API lab of the EuroSyStem project and a partner
within the Marie Curie Initial Training Network DECIDE (Decision-making within cells and differentiation entity therapies) funded by the European Union’s Seventh Programme
under grant agreement n° 315902.Peer Reviewe
