Immunological surveillance against cancer across mammals
Contrary to expectations based on their higher cell numbers, larger and longer-lived species do not face dramatically increased risk of cancer. This strongly suggests that evolution has fashioned natural cancer resistance mechanisms, yet our knowledge remains limited on what these mechanisms might be. The cancer immunological surveillance hypothesis, proposed by Burnet and Thomas in the 1950s, highlights immunity as a key factor determining species-specific cancer resistance. Here we address the original, evolutionary interpretation of this hypothesis by investigating the relationship between cancer mortality risk and markers of efficient antigen presentation. Our results show that the expansion of the MHC class I gene complex, as well as increased selection for diversity at these genes is associated with sharply decreasing cancer mortality risk across mammals. This suggests that the efficient presentation of diverse peptides in somatic cells is important for cancer suppression across mammals, providing pioneering evidence that supports the cancer immunosurveillance hypothesis across species.
Authors
- Amy M. Boddy (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7990-2415)
- Antoine Marie Dujon (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1579-9156)
- Fernando Colchero (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8613-4568)
- Jean‐François Lemaître (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9898-2353)
- Dalia A. Conde (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7923-8163)
- Damien Chevallier (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2232-6787)
- Tamás Malkócs (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6582-1219)
- Justus Hagemann (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3924-7230)
- Samuel Pavard (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6803-8123)
- Alexandre Corthay (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9519-5725)
- Tuul Sepp (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8677-7069)
- Beáta Újvári (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2391-2988)
- Thomas Pradeu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6590-3281)
- Carlo C. Maley (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0745-7076)
- Piotr Minias (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7742-6750)
- Orsolya Vincze (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5789-2124)
- Mathieu Giraudeau
- Frédéric Thomas (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2238-1978)
- Louise Maille
Institutions
- Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1 (FR)
- Oslo University Hospital (NO)
- Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR)
- Deakin University (AU)
- Université de Bordeaux (FR)
- University of California, Santa Barbara (US)
- University of Southern Denmark (DK)
- University of Oslo (NO)
- Chapman University (US)
- Université de Montpellier (FR)
- Université Paris Cité (FR)
- Babeș-Bolyai University (RO)
- University of Łódź (PL)
- Sorbonne Université (FR)
- Maladies Infectieuses et Vecteurs: Écologie, Génétique, Évolution et Contrôle (FR)
- LIttoral ENvironnement et Sociétés (FR)
- Immunology from Concept and Experiments to Translation (FR)
- Institut d'Histoire et de Philosophie des Sciences et des Techniques (FR)
- Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology (DE)
- HUN-REN Centre for Ecological Research (HU)
- Éco-Anthropologie (FR)
- Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Martinique (MQ)
- Laboratoire de Biométrie et Biologie Evolutive (FR)
- Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (FR)
- Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (FR)
- Arizona State University (US)
- University of Tartu (EE)
- La Rochelle Université (FR)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Nature Communications
- Published
- 2025-11-24
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-65286-x
- Citations
- 2
- Primary Topic
- Cancer Immunotherapy and Biomarkers
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 2.09