“What cancer is easiest to avoid?”

Instructions

Part of learning, is the ability to assimilate information and explain it in your own words.  The goal of this assignment is for you to practice using your new vocabulary and knowledge of cancer. 

Part 1

Ask a family member, close friend or relative for a cancer-related question that they would like answered.

1. State your question at the top of the page.

2. Answer in at least 3 paragraphs and you should include at least 2 sources you used to answer the question which you must paraphrase, that is read and rewrite in your own words.  

Citations

·         Do not make your entire body of text direct quotations from your reference(s).

·         If you paraphrase, you still need to put an in-text citation next to it.

·         If you are unsure if you are paraphrasing correctly, it may be best to use direct quotations.

·         Citation style does not matter. Use the direct URL in your in-text citation and make sure the URL leads back to your source. If we can’t find what you are referencing it will not count.

Use the following sites as a starting point to find credible information:  

National Cancer Institute, The American Cancer Society, 

The PubMed Data base and Medline Plus.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/  Science Daily

https://www.sciencenews.org/  Science News

Any sign of plagiarism will be investigated and you will receive a zero for the assignment and you will be reported to the Academic Honesty Board.

Below is AN example of a WA#2 I chose it because the writer did a good job of

“attribution” meaning she read rephrased and referenced and followed all

directions. You could also use authors names instead of numbers or

references in MLS or other standard formats.

The key is to read, digest, rephrase and cite.

LMAYQ WA#2 Micro Bio of Cancer and AIDS

29 October 2015

Writing Assignment Number 2

My roommate asked me “What cancer is easiest to avoid?”

Lifestyle choices are the greatest risk factors for cancer. Behaviors like eating unhealthy foods,

smoking tobacco and not using sun block can cause cancer. However, in the sense of being avoidable, it is hard to determine what cancer would be “easier” to avoid. I will focus on cervical

cancer and lung cancer because the risk of those cancers are based on behavior.

In my opinion, cervical cancer is easiest to avoid because of the link between Human

Papillomavirus (HPV) and cervical cancer. HPV is “suggested to be responsible for an estimated

100% of cases of cervical cancer”(1). Cancer is the uncontrolled growth of cells, cervical cancer

refers to uncontrolled cell growth in the cervix, which is located between the vagina and uterus.

Normally cells grow, and die (apoptosis). But HPV binds to DNA which causes it to create the

protein E6 which binds to p53 to prevent apoptosis in the cells. HPV also causes the release of

protein E7 which prevents a cell from stopping growth which causes dysplasia. Cervical cancer

is highly avoidable because of the vaccine against HPV (1). Everyone should be vaccinated

against HPV to avoid all cancers linked to HPV “vaccination has been shown to be viable

method in the prevention of HPV-related pathologies” (1). It is easy to avoid cervical cancer if

individuals make the lifestyle choice to protect themselves against HPV.

Lung cancer causes more death in US women than all other cancers (2). There is no doubt that

smoking tobacco is the leading cause of lung cancer. A national lung screening trial determined

that “smoking is the largest contributor to lung cancer risk”(3). Therefore, the best way to avoid

lung cancer is simply by abstaining from smoking. However, smoking can be hard to avoid

sometimes because of the life choices of others. Second hand smoke can be just as harmful as

smoking. The way that smoking causes cancer is by breaking down cells in the esophagus and

then ‘shredding’ DNA. The walls of the esophagus are weakened by the chemicals found in

tobacco products, then the tar (benzopyrene diol expoxide) in the tobacco smoke penetrates the

stem cell layer and sticks to the DNA. When the tar gets onto the DNA it has been shown in rats

to cause “modulation of expression of metabolic genes [..] and repair genes (Nrf2, Rad51)”(4).

Repair genes are important because they check for mutations and errors that could lead to cancer,

without these repair genes risk of cancer greatly increases. Lung cancer is not always easily

avoidable because of how addictive smoking can be for certain individuals. However, if an

individual makes the choice to abstain from smoking they can easily avoid lung cancer.

1)http://www.cdc.gov/cancer/dcpc/data/women.htm

2)http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26186471

3)http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26502000

4)http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26090558

Plagiarism • Anything that is not common knowledge or your own work must be cited both in-text and in literature cited. • This includes articles, peer-reviewed papers, websites, books, etc. • This does not only apply to direct quotes, it applies to anything that is not your own idea or common knowledge. • What is common knowledge? • Smoking is bad for your health. • What is not considered common knowledge? • Heritability for smoking in twin studies range from 46-86% (Batra et al., 2003).

Avoiding Plagiarism https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/589/01/ This is a great resource if you are unsure about plagiarism and how to avoid it in your writing for this class and any other class you are taking.http://www.cdc.gov/cancer/dcpc/data/women.htmhttp://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26186471http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26502000http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26090558https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/589/01/