Abstract
Cancer is a complex and multifaceted disease having a number of composite problems to be considered including cancer immune evasion, therapy resistance, and recurrence for prevention and cure. Fundamentally it remains a genetic disease as diverse aspects of the complexity of tumor growth and cancer development relate to its genetic machinery and requires addressing the problems at the level of genome and epigenome. Presumably, the mutational changes occurring in the regulatory genes responsible for maintaining optimal cell growth, proliferation, and differentiation gradually lead to cancer progression and metastasis. Importantly, patients with the same cancer types respond differently to cancer therapies, indicating the need for a patient-specific treatment option for cancer cure. Precision oncology is a form of cancer therapy that focuses on the genetic profiling of individual tumors to identify molecular alterations involved in cancer development for custom-tailored personalized treatment of the disease. It is to rely upon the genomic study of cancer cells to get a clear picture of the prognosis and pathways involved in disease progression and to look for the means to selectively target them to ensure effective treatment of the deadly disease. Precision oncology now combines cancer diagnosis and prognosis followed by designing a treatment regimen for precise treatment of cancer at different stages and times. Recent advances in molecular technologies have indeed accelerated the implementation of precision oncology management, leading to improved clinical outcomes in selected cohorts of patients. This article aims to briefly explain the foundations and frontiers of precision oncology in the context of ongoing technological advances in this regard to assess its scope and importance in the realization of a proper cure for cancer.