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New Links Found Between Bacteria and Cancer
Shipud writes "A recent study by a group at the University of Maryland School of Medicine shows that bacterial DNA gets transferred to human cells, in a process known as lateral gene transfer, or LGT. LGT is known to occur quite commonly between bacteria, including bacteria of different species. In fact, that is how antibiotic resistance is transferred so quickly. The team has shown that certain types of tumor cells acquire bacterial DNA that may play a role in tumor progression. Another group at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill has shown that gut inflammation leads to a radical change in the microbial population there, which encourages growth of E. coli that can disrupt the inflamed cells' DNA, leading to cancer. Both studies enable us to ask new questions such as: how does inflammation change the landscape for bacterial colonization? Can bacteria indeed harness inflammation — and then cancer — to flourish and remove competitors from their newly found ecosystem? And can we use this information to fight cancer?"
I always knew the gays were behind cancer.... LesbianGayTransgender=LGT...... the republicans were right all along
The number 1 killer in the first world, by a wide margin, is heart disease, caused by aging muscles and blood pressure increases. In the third world, lots of relatively simple, preventable illnesses are a common cause of death.
You do know heart disease is a relatively simple, preventable illness right? It just requires you to stop eating so much of the poisonous garbage they call 'food' in developed countries. More so in the US with it's love for chemicals.
Don't complain about syntax, grammar, or spelling. There is no.hell like input on android.
Oh, thanks. I've just learned something. I have used resistance to antibiotics as an example of real-time observable evolution. If it is actually lateral transfer, then this example won't hold. Good to know!
I don't have any proper medical education, so can someone tell me why so much of modern medicine involves controlling or preventing inflammation? It seems to cause or contribute a lot of dangerous conditions.
What is the natural biological benefit (Why did we evolve it?) that inflammation is supposed to achieve?
More so in the US with it's love for chemicals.
Well at least it's not like your country, where you eat too many apostrophes and occasionally puke them out when you're ranting.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Also termed lateral gene transfer
Can they therefore derive that people who have had to take much antibiotics throughout their lives for other conditions, statistically have less cancer?
I think he was talking about recent articles like the one below that have shown connections from inflammation and major diseases. http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/article/29235
You know that this is complete and utter garbage, and that people still get old, right? That you're a moron throwing around your ignorance like a giant ill-informed medicine ball?
"Chemicals" doesn't mean anything. You want to talk about specific chemicals and their poorly understood interaction with biology, well, that's just dandy. Like want to talk about metabolization of monosaccharides versus polysaccharides? Be my guest. Want to think that mysterious "chemicals" beyond human comprehension, then you're a goddamn moron.
There are some players we managed to get out of the game. Many infections are no longer allowed to play. Thus higher numbers win more often now, and our average life expectancy increases. But the sum of all death cause margins will still be 100 percent, and if we manage to get each single cause to a margin of less than 1%, it just means, that we have to have literally hundred of different ways to die.
Apparently having a basic understanding of biology, nutrition, and chemistry is "brainwashed". The difference between prosciutto and bacon is how the poor-little-piggy is butchered. You'll find prosciutto with plenty of damned preservative phosphates, basic salting, and antibiotics as common bacon, and you can, in fact, find bacon that is 100% organic with no such treatment.
You're essentially saying here: "No get the filet mignon, it's less toxic than the ribeye, you know, because it's french". There is no logical basis to your beliefs, and if you can cite so much as one "chemical" by name that you honestly believe to be the source of heart disease, I will be utterly surprised.
I certainly can name several, by you'll be surprised at just how natural they are.
I'll have to agree with i kan reed, you're way way way on the outer fringes. How about the world lifeexpectancy link the AC gave you. Or, if you're a wikipedia truster you'll see the same thing - heart disease is the number one killer worldwide. The US rate is lower than the world wide rate, so maybe it's time to change your rant, like maybe drop it entirely and catch back up with the real world.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.
Specifically taking probiotic supplements, yogurt, etc?
Bark less. Wag more.
Fun science fact: it takes twice as much MSG to kill a rat than it does salt if you count by number of molecules, and 5.5x as much if you count by mass.
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
Fox News called it... Gay marriage is going to kill us all!
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
The immune system, innate and acquired, is sort of your own personal military-industrial complex, and has a nasty tendency to sometimes go off the rails and start killing civilians in an increasingly paranoid response to minimal or nonexistent security threats, giving us autoimmune disorders.
Consider the evolutionary theory of pathogen Molecular Mimicry -- infectious agents that adopt motifs that resemble normal host antigens should have a selective advantage. In an absolute form, the theory is not completely accepted -- immunological cross-reactivity between host and pathogen could be due to evolution, or it could be due to chance -- and examples exist that support either case. But I think it is likely that the mechanism operates at least some situations.
The consequence is that a somewhat over-active immune system may actually be the optimum state, with the particular degree of paranoia being the amount that best balances the trade-off between autoimmune disease risk against infection outcomes.
Duuuh! Bacteria don't use Linux, they run something with a microkernel archetecture.
Who is John Cabal?
We the People need to reject the feudal economics that says a government can only spend what it takes in, and vote accordingly. We must remember that Lincoln created over $400 million greenbacks to raise money without increasing taxes or borrowing it. Reagan proved deficits don't matter. Japan has a 230% debt-to-gdp ratio and a currency it keeps trying to devalue. The US has had a national debt since Alexander Hamilton in the first administration assumed the states' war debts; none of the predictions of grandchildren being worse off than their grandparents have ever come true.
Debt is a distraction. The focus should be on innovation and the advance of knowledge. Knowledge confers the greatest survival fitness by better enabling us to predict and adapt to sudden catastrophic change.
So... forgive me, but why didn't you? The link was right there on the Wikipedia article you cited.
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!