Research Perspective Advance Articles

Figure 2. The relationship between a species’ body mass and cancer incidence is not predicted to be flat (dotted line) by Peto’s paradox. It is the predicted dramatic relationship with body mass that is the null hypothesis for Peto’s paradox (solid line). A comparative relationship (dashed) that has a shallower slope than this null hypothesis is no proof against the validity of Peto’s paradox. Note, however, that the exact shape of null prediction of the relationship between a species’ body mass and cancer incidence is not known, it is however predicted to be dramatic (as in Figure 1).