There’s an interesting glimpse into recent human evolution in the latest edition of PLoS Genetics. It comes from a team of scientists whose corresponding author is Chad Huff, of the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas. The paper is...
It is now well documented that the best way for an infant’s gut (largely sterile at birth) to get populated by the bacterial components of a healthy microbiota is through its mother’s milk. Over 700 species of bacteria have been found in breast milk...
There are two related and interesting articles on cancer evolution in a recent edition of eLife. The first is a commentary by Devon M Fitzgerald and Susan M Rosenberg, of the Baylor College of Medicine, on a paper in the same issue titled “TGF-β reduces DNA...
This is a heads up for a very useful essay, written by Mel Greaves, for The Darwin Cancer Blog – a blog dedicated to commenting on evolutionary approaches to cancer. In this essay, titled “Ways of Escape”, Greaves draws a number of comparisons...
Aging is associated with a number of chronic diseases – cardiovascular disease, diabetes, Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias, and cancer. They are all part of the process of immunosenescence. The chronic inflammation that is a feature of the declining...
