Racial Differences In Response To Bowel Cancer Genetic Risk Factor
Scientists have for the first time discovered that people with the same cancer susceptibility genes respond differently depending on their race. Their results are published in Nature Genetics* .
The team from the University of Edinburgh has shown that a genetic marker is associated with an increased the risk of colon cancer in Europeans, but not in the Japanese population. But this genetic variant was associated with a similar risk of rectal cancer in both populations.
While dietary differences are already well known to be important, this discovery shows for the first time that genetic factors might explain some of the differences in bowel cancer risk between populations**.
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