Molecular Bases of Cancer

This graduate-level course treats cancer as a genetic disease that unfolds in stages, tracing how mutations in oncogenes, tumor suppressors, and genome-maintenance genes hijack the normal circuitry of proliferation, apoptosis, and tissue organization. Working primarily from Weinberg's textbook alongside current journal articles, students read deeply into each layer of tumor biology, write up research-paper assignments, and present case studies that connect molecular mechanisms to clinical behavior like metastasis, immune evasion, and therapy response. It pulls together what you already know from molecular biology, genetics, and cell signaling into one coherent disease framework, and serves as the conceptual foundation for anyone heading toward cancer research, oncology, or translational biomedicine.