Barrett

Barrett, The Honors College at Arizona State University proudly showcases the work of undergraduate honors students by sharing this collection exclusively with the ASU community.

Barrett accepts high performing, academically engaged undergraduate students and works with them in collaboration with all of the other academic units at Arizona State University. All Barrett students complete a thesis or creative project which is an opportunity to explore an intellectual interest and produce an original piece of scholarly research. The thesis or creative project is supervised and defended in front of a faculty committee. Students are able to engage with professors who are nationally recognized in their fields and committed to working with honors students. Completing a Barrett thesis or creative project is an opportunity for undergraduate honors students to contribute to the ASU academic community in a meaningful way.

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Cancer Across Vertebrates

Description
Cancer is a problem of multicellularity, making it a problem across all species. This pervasiveness has led to much research into the defense and the pathology of the disease. Previously, studies have been limited in sample size, taxonomic breadth, and comparative methods to explain and understand the data available. Here,…

Cancer is a problem of multicellularity, making it a problem across all species. This pervasiveness has led to much research into the defense and the pathology of the disease. Previously, studies have been limited in sample size, taxonomic breadth, and comparative methods to explain and understand the data available. Here, we have access to life history and cancer risk data of 17,563 individuals for 327 species, spanning across three monophyletic clades: Amphibians, Sauropsids, and Mammals. Comparative biology’s approach to cross-species cancer prevalence is crucial to the identification of species that are uniquely resistant to cancer as well as stratifying risk across a phylogeny based on the life history framework. Using the life history framework, alongside a multitude of life history data, was able to find that neoplasia prevalence increases with adult weight and longevity, but decreases with gestation time. It was also discovered that malignancy prevalence decreases with gestation time. Gestation and adult weight are also both significant predictors of neoplasia and malignancy prevalence when controlling for the other. On an evolutionary scale, cancer risk appears to be best described by sudden shifts in cancer prevalence followed by stabilizing selection of that trait. The understanding of increases and decreases of cancer risk across species could create better insight on human’s own cancer risk, as well as disease prevention in humans.
ContributorsMellon, Walker (Author) / Maley, Carlo (Thesis director) / Compton, Zachary (Committee member) / Mallo, Diego (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Department of Information Systems (Contributor) / Department of Economics (Contributor)
Created2022-12