General interest questions

[Rhett Valino Pascual]

In article <2ju5gv$g76 at agate.berkeley.edu>,
 <hcorbett at garnet.berkeley.edu> wrote:
>
>Do men get breast cancer?

Someone already answered this, but I wanted to give a more descriptive 
view.  Human males do get breast cancer but this is quite rare.  One 
reason is the presence of testosterone in the body.  As far as I know, 
the reason for cancer of the breast is not quantitatively known.  That is 
to say that we have models of how cancer can occur, but we don't know 
whether our models hold for humans.  

It is generally thought that proliferation of cells has something to do 
with cancer.  In the male, proliferation of the breast epithelial cells 
can be due to estrogen and other hormones such as prolactin and 
corticoids and even growth factors.  



-- 
***********************************************************************
Rhett V. Pascual   :   gldnbear at uclink.berkeley.edu   :   Cal '90
If you are an alum from UC Berkeley, ask me about the private e-mail 
directory I am compiling.  GO BEARS!!!