Cancer clues from another species
Harvard researchers have decoded the genome of a creature that may prove an unlikely ally in the fight against both cancer and aging: the naked mole rat. The animal, which lives in large, underground colonies, has many attributes that cause it to stand out from its mammalian relatives. Most important for medical research is that it has never been observed to develop cancer, and lives far longer than the mice and rats that are its best-studied relatives, according to Vadim Gladyshev, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women’s Hospital. Naked mole rats, which are native to equatorial Africa, are one of only two known eusocial mammals that live in colonies headed by a queen, who does all the breeding. The animals, hairless, with poor eyesight and protruding teeth, are adapted to living in the dark and in a very low oxygen environment that has high levels...