Abstract
Despite recent notable progress in medical sciences, cancer remains a leading cause of human death worldwide, accounting for about one-quarter of human deaths in wealthy countries and about one-eighth worldwide (Ferlay et al. 2010). In fact, the progress in cancer research has been slower compared with that achieved related to other pathologies, such as cardiovascular disorders. This is mainly because of the enormous complexity of this disease, which exhibits sophisticated cellular mechanisms that are the targets of evolutionary processes driven by random genetic and epigenetic mutations.
Highlights
Despite recent notable progress in medical sciences, cancer remains a leading cause of human death worldwide, accounting for about one-quarter of human deaths in wealthy countries and about one-eighth worldwide (Ferlay et al 2010)
Speakers: Frederic Thomas (Center for Ecological and Evolutionary Research on Cancer, Montpellier, France); Athena Aktipis, Jekaterina Erenpreisa (Latvian Biomedical Research and Study Centre, Latvia); Carlo Maley (Biodesign Institute, School of life Sciences, Arizona State University, Tempe AZ, USA). This last session focused on the impact of cancer on the evolution of organisms
Applying ecological and evolutionary theory to cancer: a long and winding road
Summary
Despite recent notable progress in medical sciences, cancer remains a leading cause of human death worldwide, accounting for about one-quarter of human deaths in wealthy countries and about one-eighth worldwide (Ferlay et al 2010). It appears crucial to adopt this evolutionary perspective for our understanding of cancer, its origin, the possible ways to control neoplastic progression, and to prevent therapeutic failures (Merlo et al 2006; Aktipis and Nesse 2013; Thomas et al 2013). These ideas originated in the mid-seventies, many promising opportunities for the application of evolutionary biology to carcinogenesis and oncology remain unexplored and questions unanswered. Roche and Thomas tify challenges and opportunities in cancer therapies and new horizons for cancer prevention
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