Carcinogenesis Advance Access originally published online on July 19, 2007
Carcinogenesis 2007 28(8):1621; doi:10.1093/carcin/bgm139
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Molecular cancer epidemiology: a tale of >3842 publications
Lifestyle, Environment and Cancer Group, International Agency for Research on Cancer, 150 Cours Albert Thomas, 69008 Lyon, France
* To whom correspondence should be addressed. Tel: +33 472738554; Fax: +33 472738320; Email: boffetta{at}iarc.fr
Although molecular epidemiology is not a new discipline, and laboratory methods have been applied for decades to epidemiological studies of cardiovascular, infectious and other types of diseases, the paper by Perera et al. (1) on the application of DNA adducts to cancer research in an epidemiologic framework, which was published in the Journal of Chronic Diseases 25 years ago, is often identified as the starting event of molecular cancer epidemiology. However, in the previous decade there had been examples of application of different types of biomarkers to cancer epidemiology: measurements of bile acid metabolites were correlated to colorectal cancer risk, notably by Wynder et al. (2,3), and markers of genetic polymorphisms in the metabolism of aromatic amines were correlated to bladder cancer risk (4). The (biomarker-based) identification of hepatitis B virus as a cause of hepatocellular carcinoma also dates from the mid-1970s (5).
The paper by Perera et al. represented an important contribution because it provided for the first time a theoretical construct for the application of novel molecular techniques to cancer epidemiology. In the following years, the discipline flourished and within a decade it was solidly established with its own textbooks, journals, classes and doctoral programmes. In this respect, it is important to restate that the main goal of molecular epidemiology is to contribute the prevention of cancer by contributing to the identification of human carcinogens, establishing their mechanisms, identifying susceptible groups of the population and developing preventive strategies (6).
The study by Ugolini et al. (7)—including Perera herself—published in this issue of Carcinogenesis represents an important effort to quantify the bibliographic importance of molecular cancer epidemiology. Conducting a comprehensive bibliographic search of a whole discipline is a complex task, and the strategy adopted by Ugolini et al. might have resulted in a focus on studies of environmental and occupational biomarkers with a more limited inclusion of research based on nutritional, immunological or infectious biomarkers. The complexity of the task might reflect the uncertain epistemological location of molecular epidemiology: various authors have provided over the years different definitions of the discipline, spanning from a subentity of clinical epidemiology (8) to an applied form of molecular biology and genetics (9). Despite a possible bias in their approach, the analysis by Ugolini et al. underlines some patterns that probably reflect true phenomena. If the predominance of the USA, Canada, the Nordic countries, the Netherlands, the UK and Israel matches the results of similar analyses in the field of epidemiology in general (10), the relatively important role of Asian countries such as Japan, Taiwan, China and Korea is less expected and certainly represents a positive signal. Furthermore, while the majority of epidemiological studies are published in journals with intermediate impact factor, a trend appeared during the period analysed by Ugolini et al. towards increasing average impact factor. This may reflect both an increased ability of molecular epidemiology to publish in higher level journals and an increase in average impact factor of mainstream molecular epidemiological journals, including Carcinogenesis.
If the 3842 publications retained by Ugolini et al. in their analysis do not represent the full production of molecular cancer epidemiology, they certainly illustrate the level of maturity reached by the discipline. The growing understanding of the mechanisms of carcinogenesis (11), the various whole-genome scans which are under way and the increasing ability to apply different—omics technologies to population-based studies open new avenues for the next generation of molecular epidemiological studies. However, these fantastic opportunities should not reduce the emphasis on the need for methodological rigour in the design, conduct and analysis of studies and for improvements in the weakest part of the discipline, namely the development of reliable and valid high-throughput approaches for biomarker-based exposure assessment (12).
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Conflicts of Interest Statement: None declared.
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- Perera FP, et al. Molecular epidemiology and carcinogen-DNA adduct detection: new approaches to studies of human cancer causation. J. Chronic Dis. (1982) 35:581–600.[CrossRef][Web of Science][Medline]
- Wynder EL, et al. Metabolic epidemiology of colorectal cancer. Cancer (1974) 34:801–806.[CrossRef][Medline]
- Reddy BS, et al. Further leads on metabolic epidemiology of large bowel cancer. Cancer Res. (1975) 35:3403–3406.
[Abstract/Free Full Text] - Lower GM Jr, et al. N-acetyltransferase phenotype and risk in urinary bladder cancer: approaches in molecular epidemiology. Preliminary results in Sweden and Denmark. Environ. Health Perspect. (1979) 29:71–79.[Web of Science][Medline]
- Beasley RP, et al. Hepatoma risk among HBsAg carriers. Am. J. Epidemiol. (1978) 108:247.
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[Abstract/Free Full Text] - Ugolini D, et al. A bibliometric analysis of scientific production in cancer molecular epidemiology. Carcinogenesis (2007).
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[Abstract/Free Full Text] - Shields PG, et al. Molecular epidemiology and the genetics of environmental cancer. JAMA (1991) 266:681–687.
[Abstract/Free Full Text] - Soteriades ES, Falagas ME. A bibliometric analysis in the fields of preventive medicine, occupational and environmental medicine, epidemiology, and public health. BMC Public Health (2006) 6:301.[CrossRef][Medline]
- Hanahan D, et al. The hallmarks of cancer. Cell (2000) 100:57–70.[CrossRef][Web of Science][Medline]
- Wild CP. Complementing the genome with an "exposome": the outstanding challenge of environmental exposure measurement in molecular epidemiology. Cancer Epidemiol. Biomarkers Prev. (2005) 14:1847–1850.
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