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Why DNA damage from smoking and UV rays cause cancer in some but not others

cam.ac.uk

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Re: Why DNA damage from smoking and UV rays cause cancer in some but not others

#41

Post by NikolaNovak »

brightball wrote: post #29
aantix wrote: post #3

Anecdotally, whenever I go swimming with my kids in the summer, and I don't put sunscreen on right away, but let myself get some intense direct sun, I feel good and sleep really well that night. As long as I don't let myself get in a red, sunburn situation.

I typically do the same thing. I only wear sunscreen if I am planning on being in direct sun for an extended period of time where I can't easily get back in the shade. The more you're able to build up a base tan the less you need it to avoid a burn at least.

Isn't tanning basically body's reaction to cellular damage? It reduces further damage but that's due to damage done?

(It's largely irrelevant to myself, I pretty much burn immediately and don't / can't really tan, but my wife and her family tan well).

Re: Why DNA damage from smoking and UV rays cause cancer in some but not others

#42

Post by brightball »

NikolaNovak wrote: post #41
brightball wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I typically do the same thing. I only wear sunscreen if I am planning on being in direct sun for an extended period of time where I can't easily get back in the shade. The more you're able to build up a base tan the less you need it to avoid a burn at least.

Isn't tanning basically body's reaction to cellular damage? It reduces further damage but that's due to damage done? (It's largely irrelevant to myself, I pretty much burn immediately and don't / can't really tan, but my wife and her family tan well).

30 years ago I was a lifeguard and got to experiment with this some. I can't tell you the biology specifically, but I have always tanned quickly. The less tan I am, the more easily I burn.

Always been that way for me at least.

Re: Why DNA damage from smoking and UV rays cause cancer in some but not others

#43

Post by spacephysics »

bob1029 wrote: post #13
aantix wrote: post #3

Anecdotally, whenever I go swimming with my kids in the summer, and I don't put sunscreen on right away, but let myself get some intense direct sun, I feel good and sleep really well that night. As long as I don't let myself get in a red, sunburn situation.

I can spend a solid hour in the sun before I start to burn, assuming I have a hat on my head. I've also noticed some correlation between my diet and how fast I burn. Whenever my metabolism is running at/near ketogenesis, it seems like it takes a lot longer for the sun to affect me.

I experienced similar reaction when i was doing keto. It became far more difficult to burn that summer

Re: Why DNA damage from smoking and UV rays cause cancer in some but not others

#44

Post by tombert »

Mezzie wrote: post #27
tombert wrote: post #24

I've only ever smoked like a quarter of one cigarette when I was eighteen and I thought it was fucking gross so I never picked up the habit (fortunately). That said, I'm a pretty pale dude and my sister has gotten skin cancer twice now [1], so I've started getting a bit worried that that's going to happen to me. I've started wearing a baseball cap every time I go outside to protect my scalp (since my body has decided…

Strong recommend a UV umbrella. I also hate the feeling of sunscreen and will also fry the minute I so much as look at the sun. Also, linen clothing. Far more comfortable in heat while keeping you covered. Hoodies and jeans sounds miserable.

I've more or less gotten used to the jeans.

Probably due to a combination of undiagnosed autism and some very mild bullying in middle school (due to me growing rapidly and people making fun of me for wearing "short shorts"), I have been almost exclusively wearing jeans for everywhere but the gym since eighth grade.

The hoodies are a more recent thing and are more miserable. I'll check out linen clothing.

Re: Why DNA damage from smoking and UV rays cause cancer in some but not others

#46

Post by tartoran »

dyauspitr wrote: post #23
mr_mitm wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The way I read the article was that cancer is caused by deficiencies in the body's repair mechanism. It appears as if some have a more robust mechanism than others, depending on genetics.

My mom had 14 siblings and only one of them got breast cancer (she was a nun and never breastfed which drastically increases a woman’s odds of breast cancer). But prior to that, her mother’s family, which was also large never had a case of cancer. My mom’s siblings also had around 30 kids between them some now in their 60s. There hasn’t been a single case of cancer amongst the kids either. So it’s something like 150…

Yes, genetics play a big part but my understanding that cancer is influenced by both genetic and environmental factors. It's possible to have similar habits in the family with respect to sun exposure, alcohol consumtion, diets etc..

Re: Why DNA damage from smoking and UV rays cause cancer in some but not others

#47

Post by crims0n »

As a millennial growing up it was beaten into our head that smoking was a death sentence. I recently looked up what the actual cancer rate among smokers was... about 125k people in the US die of lung cancer annual. 25 million people smoke annually. That is a 0.5% chance for occasional smokers. Even if you smoke a pack a day your entire life, the cancer rate is less than 15%.

I am in no way saying it is okay to smoke, there are obviously other health risks associated with it... but researching that made me feel much better about that one pack a year I buy for vacation.

Re: Why DNA damage from smoking and UV rays cause cancer in some but not others

#48

Post by Krssst »

Mezzie wrote: post #27
tombert wrote: post #24

I've only ever smoked like a quarter of one cigarette when I was eighteen and I thought it was fucking gross so I never picked up the habit (fortunately). That said, I'm a pretty pale dude and my sister has gotten skin cancer twice now [1], so I've started getting a bit worried that that's going to happen to me. I've started wearing a baseball cap every time I go outside to protect my scalp (since my body has decided…

Strong recommend a UV umbrella. I also hate the feeling of sunscreen and will also fry the minute I so much as look at the sun. Also, linen clothing. Far more comfortable in heat while keeping you covered. Hoodies and jeans sounds miserable.

I would bet on the sunscreen being a better protection since it also protects against reflected light, but UV umbrellas are so much more convenient. Takes 2s to take out rather than 5min to apply sunscreen properly.

(except when it's windy. Rain usually follows the wind, sunlight does not)

Re: Why DNA damage from smoking and UV rays cause cancer in some but not others

#49

Post by vondur »

brightball wrote: post #29
aantix wrote: post #3

Anecdotally, whenever I go swimming with my kids in the summer, and I don't put sunscreen on right away, but let myself get some intense direct sun, I feel good and sleep really well that night. As long as I don't let myself get in a red, sunburn situation.

I typically do the same thing. I only wear sunscreen if I am planning on being in direct sun for an extended period of time where I can't easily get back in the shade. The more you're able to build up a base tan the less you need it to avoid a burn at least.

I'm pretty light skinned and the burn pretty easily. I just put on sunscreen by default when going hiking/mountain biking. I'm really excited for the new sunscreens coming out here in the US that have those new to us ingredients that the Euro's have had forever.

Re: Why DNA damage from smoking and UV rays cause cancer in some but not others

#50

Post by TaupeRanger »

Very common press release/headline meme: the question in the title of the article is literally never answered (or the opposite of the headline's claim is true). This research plainly DOES NOT explain why certain mice got cancer and others didn't, let alone why smoking/UV rays cause cancer in some humans but not others. There was no control group for exposed mice that would've allowed them to look at which biological differences made one group get tumors and the others not (the study doesn't appear to actually be interested in that question).

The language here is also pretty hyperbolic. We've known for decades that certain gene mutations cause increased cancer risk in the context of a certain genetic background (BRCA1/2, etc.). Using language like "for the first time" is just juvenile, or purposeful lying at worst.

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