Marco Tonelli

Lung cancer and oral microbiota: possible connections in never-smokers

Lung cancer and oral microbiota: possible connections in never-smokers

MicrobiotaMi Comment 23_21
by Marco Tonelli

Lung cancer is the first cause of death among cancer-related deaths. The majority of cases is related to tobacco smoking, nevertheless, 25% of lung cancer cases occur in non-smokers. As we already know, there are lots of other risk factors, such as household and outdoor air pollution, secondhand tobacco smoke, radon exposure and so on. The study by Hosgood et al., published on Thorax, aims at finding an association between …

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The relationship between microbiota and human local adaptation

The relationship between microbiota and human local adaptation

MicrobiotaMi Comment 01_20
by Marco Tonelli

It is well known that human beings had to genetically adapt themselves to the different local conditions across the entire world: in particular they had to adapt to different climates, diets and pathogens that can be encountered during lifetime. As an example, it is very clear the important role of hypoxia-inducible facto 2-alpha (encoded by EPAS1) for people who live in high altitudes, or even the beta-globin gene haplotypes …

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