Table 1.

Features of microorganisms which make them an ideal model system for studying evolution experimentally (Elena and Lenski 2003) and parallels in cancer cells

Microorganisms	Cancer cells	Advantages for evolutionary experiments
Easy to propagate and enumerate	Immortal lines can be easily grown, and lines which have been used extensively in research for decades are well enumerated	Cells can be grown at low cost and in high volumes. Prior details of normal behaviour allow interesting mutants to be identified
Fast replication	Generation time of approximately 1 day	Allows experiments to conceivably run for many generations
Manipulable mutation rates	Elevated mutation rate compared to noncancerous cells	Facilitates variation by mutation within the population
Large populations exist in small spaces	Billions of cells can be grown in tissue culture flasks	Aids experimental replication
Stored easily and indefinitely in suspended animation	Cells can easily be frozen and revived	Enables comparisons between ancestral and evolved lineages; lineages can be catalogued and revived
Asexual reproduction	Cells divide mitotically	Clonality assists experimental replication
Easily manipulated experimental conditions and genetic composition of founding populations	Culture resources and environment are easily controlled	Allows identification of environmental and genetic influences on evolutionary processes; advancements in sequencing means genetic identification is easier and more cost-effective than ever before