Cancer susceptibility and reproductive trade-offs: a model of the evolution of cancer defences

The factors influencing cancer susceptibility and why it varies across species are major open questions in the field of cancer biology. One underexplored source of variation in cancer susceptibility may arise from trade-offs between reproductive competitiveness (e.g. sexually selected traits, earlie...

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Main Authors:	Boddy, Amy M., Kokko, Hanna, Breden, Felix, Wilkinson, Gerald S., Aktipis, C. Athena
Format:	Online
Language:	English
Published:	The Royal Society 2015
Online Access:	https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4581025/

id	pubmed-4581025
recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	pubmed-45810252015-10-01 Cancer susceptibility and reproductive trade-offs: a model of the evolution of cancer defences Boddy, Amy M. Kokko, Hanna Breden, Felix Wilkinson, Gerald S. Aktipis, C. Athena Articles The factors influencing cancer susceptibility and why it varies across species are major open questions in the field of cancer biology. One underexplored source of variation in cancer susceptibility may arise from trade-offs between reproductive competitiveness (e.g. sexually selected traits, earlier reproduction and higher fertility) and cancer defence. We build a model that contrasts the probabilistic onset of cancer with other, extrinsic causes of mortality and use it to predict that intense reproductive competition will lower cancer defences and increase cancer incidence. We explore the trade-off between cancer defences and intraspecific competition across different extrinsic mortality conditions and different levels of trade-off intensity, and find the largest effect of competition on cancer in species where low extrinsic mortality combines with strong trade-offs. In such species, selection to delay cancer and selection to outcompete conspecifics are both strong, and the latter conflicts with the former. We discuss evidence for the assumed trade-off between reproductive competitiveness and cancer susceptibility. Sexually selected traits such as ornaments or large body size require high levels of cell proliferation and appear to be associated with greater cancer susceptibility. Similar associations exist for female traits such as continuous egg-laying in domestic hens and earlier reproductive maturity. Trade-offs between reproduction and cancer defences may be instantiated by a variety of mechanisms, including higher levels of growth factors and hormones, less efficient cell-cycle control and less DNA repair, or simply a larger number of cell divisions (relevant when reproductive success requires large body size or rapid reproductive cycles). These mechanisms can affect intra- and interspecific variation in cancer susceptibility arising from rapid cell proliferation during reproductive maturation, intrasexual competition and reproduction. The Royal Society 2015-07-19 /pmc/articles/PMC4581025/ /pubmed/26056364 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2014.0220 Text en http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ © 2015 The Authors. Published by the Royal Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/, which permits unrestricted use, provided the original author and source are credited.
repository_type	Open Access Journal
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	US National Center for Biotechnology Information
building	NCBI PubMed
collection	Online Access
language	English
format	Online
author	Boddy, Amy M. Kokko, Hanna Breden, Felix Wilkinson, Gerald S. Aktipis, C. Athena
spellingShingle	Boddy, Amy M. Kokko, Hanna Breden, Felix Wilkinson, Gerald S. Aktipis, C. Athena Cancer susceptibility and reproductive trade-offs: a model of the evolution of cancer defences
author_facet	Boddy, Amy M. Kokko, Hanna Breden, Felix Wilkinson, Gerald S. Aktipis, C. Athena
author_sort	Boddy, Amy M.
title	Cancer susceptibility and reproductive trade-offs: a model of the evolution of cancer defences
title_short	Cancer susceptibility and reproductive trade-offs: a model of the evolution of cancer defences
title_full	Cancer susceptibility and reproductive trade-offs: a model of the evolution of cancer defences
title_fullStr	Cancer susceptibility and reproductive trade-offs: a model of the evolution of cancer defences
title_full_unstemmed	Cancer susceptibility and reproductive trade-offs: a model of the evolution of cancer defences
title_sort	cancer susceptibility and reproductive trade-offs: a model of the evolution of cancer defences
description	The factors influencing cancer susceptibility and why it varies across species are major open questions in the field of cancer biology. One underexplored source of variation in cancer susceptibility may arise from trade-offs between reproductive competitiveness (e.g. sexually selected traits, earlier reproduction and higher fertility) and cancer defence. We build a model that contrasts the probabilistic onset of cancer with other, extrinsic causes of mortality and use it to predict that intense reproductive competition will lower cancer defences and increase cancer incidence. We explore the trade-off between cancer defences and intraspecific competition across different extrinsic mortality conditions and different levels of trade-off intensity, and find the largest effect of competition on cancer in species where low extrinsic mortality combines with strong trade-offs. In such species, selection to delay cancer and selection to outcompete conspecifics are both strong, and the latter conflicts with the former. We discuss evidence for the assumed trade-off between reproductive competitiveness and cancer susceptibility. Sexually selected traits such as ornaments or large body size require high levels of cell proliferation and appear to be associated with greater cancer susceptibility. Similar associations exist for female traits such as continuous egg-laying in domestic hens and earlier reproductive maturity. Trade-offs between reproduction and cancer defences may be instantiated by a variety of mechanisms, including higher levels of growth factors and hormones, less efficient cell-cycle control and less DNA repair, or simply a larger number of cell divisions (relevant when reproductive success requires large body size or rapid reproductive cycles). These mechanisms can affect intra- and interspecific variation in cancer susceptibility arising from rapid cell proliferation during reproductive maturation, intrasexual competition and reproduction.
publisher	The Royal Society
publishDate	2015
url	https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4581025/
_version_	1613479085352157184

Cancer susceptibility and reproductive trade-offs: a model of the evolution of cancer defences

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