THE HUMAN BREAST AND THE ANCESTRAL REPRODUCTIVE-CYCLE - A PRELIMINARY INQUIRY INTO BREAST-CANCER ETIOLOGY
THE HUMAN BREAST AND THE ANCESTRAL REPRODUCTIVE-CYCLE - A PRELIMINARY INQUIRY INTO BREAST-CANCER ETIOLOGY
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DOI：
10.1007/bf02734139
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发表时间：
1995-01-01
影响因子：
2.5
通讯作者：
STEADMAN, LB
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
COE, K;STEADMAN, LB
本文运用现代达尔文理论，对生活在西方国家的绝经前和绝经后妇女中乳腺癌发病率越来越高的现象提出了一种解释。有许多因素被认为是造成这种情况的原因：基因遗传（BRCA-1）、饮食（特别是饮食中脂肪的摄入增加）、接触致癌物质、终生月经活动和生殖因素。本文的主要目的是论证基于达尔文理论的视角的价值。本文采用达尔文理论探讨乳腺癌发病率增加的可能性，主要是由于未能及时完成生殖发育周期，从月经初潮开始，持续到一系列怀孕和哺乳。在比较数据的基础上，我们假设祖先人口中的大多数妇女在20岁左右之前就开始生孩子，并且在成年后的大部分时间里往往保持怀孕或哺乳的状态。如果一个女人在25岁左右没有孩子，她可能永远不会有一个。因此，自然选择很可能不会对抗在那个年龄之后出现的有害特征，比如癌症，就像它不会对抗老年的这些特征一样。
This paper, using modern Darwinian theory, proposes an explanation for the increasingly high incidence of breast cancer found among pre-and post-menopausal women living today in westernized countries. A number of factors have been said to be responsible: genetic inheritance (BRCA-1), diet (specifically the increased consumption of dietary fat), exposure to carcinogenic agents, lifetime menstrual activity, and reproductive factors. The primary aim of this paper is to demonstrate the value of a perspective based on Darwinian theory. In this paper, Darwinian theory is used to explore the possibility that the increased incidence of breast cancer is due primarily to the failure to complete in a timely manner the reproductive developmental cycle, beginning at menarche and continuing through a series of pregnancies and lactation. On the basis of comparative data, we assume that most women in ancestral populations began having children before age 20 or so and tended to remain either pregnant or nursing for most of their adult lives. If a woman did not have a child by age 25 or so, she probably would never have one. Therefore, selection would probably not have acted against deleterious traits, such as cancer, that appeared after that age, just as it does not act against such traits in old age.