About the Authors

Asieh Golozar

Contributed equally to this work with: Asieh Golozar, Hooman Khademi

Affiliations Digestive Disease Research Institute, Shariati Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran, Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America

Hooman Khademi

Contributed equally to this work with: Asieh Golozar, Hooman Khademi

Affiliation Digestive Disease Research Institute, Shariati Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

Farin Kamangar

Affiliations Digestive Disease Research Institute, Shariati Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran, Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America, Department of Public Health Analysis, School of Community Health and Policy, Morgan State University, Baltimore, Maryland, United States of America

Hossein Poutschi

Affiliation Digestive Disease Research Institute, Shariati Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

Farhad Islami

Affiliations Digestive Disease Research Institute, Shariati Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran, International Agency for Research on Cancer, Lyon, France

Christian C. Abnet

Affiliation Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America

Neal D. Freedman

Affiliation Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America

Philip R. Taylor

Affiliation Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America

Paul Pharoah

Affiliation Cancer Research UK, Department of Oncology, Cambridge University, Cambridge, United Kingdom

Paolo Boffetta

Affiliations The Tisch Cancer Institute, Mount Sinai School of Medicine and Institute for Translational Epidemiology, New York, New York, United States of America, International Prevention Research Institute, Lyon, France

Paul J. Brennan

Affiliation International Agency for Research on Cancer, Lyon, France

Sanford M. Dawsey

Affiliation Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America

Reza Malekzadeh

Affiliation Digestive Disease Research Institute, Shariati Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

Arash Etemadi

etemadia@mail.nih.gov

Affiliations Digestive Disease Research Institute, Shariati Hospital, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran, Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics, National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America

Competing Interests

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: AE FK FI CCA PB SMD RM. Performed the experiments: HP HK AE. Analyzed the data: AG AE FK. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: RM SMD PB PJB CCA. Wrote the paper: AG AE. Commented on the draft and edited the draft: NDF PRT PP. Read and approved the manuscript: AG HK FK HP FI CCA NDF PRT PP PB PJB SMD RM AE.