Most Cancers Due to Bad Luck — Not Environmental or Hereditary Factors. By Amy Orciari Herman Edited by Susan Sadoughi, MD, andAndré Sofair, MD, MPH Roughly two-thirds of variations in cancer risk across different tissue types can be attributed to bad luck — namely, mutations that occur randomly during DNA replication in healthy stem cells — researchers conclude inScience. The researchers compared the rate of stem cell division in 31 types of tissues with the average lifetime risk for certain cancers in the U.S. (breast and prostate cancers were excluded). They found that the correlation between the number of stem cell divisions and lifetime cancer risk was striking, with 65% of the differences in risk across tissues attributable to the number or stem cell divisions in those tissues. In the Wall Street Journal, the studys lead author cautioned that lung, skin, and other cancers are strongly associated with factors like smoking and exposure to sunlight, and people should still try to minimize these behaviors. Rather, he said he hoped the findings would lead to a greater focus on earlier detection of malignancies that are less influenced by lifestyle changes. Science article (Free abstract). Wall Street Journal story (Subscription required).
Posted on: Tue, 06 Jan 2015 00:08:10 +0000
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