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Right. But how did anyone come across this knowledge? Who would suspect that a particular creature might be better at fighting cancer than all the others?
by lordnacho 5y ago
Right. But how did anyone come across this knowledge? Who would suspect that a particular creature might be better at fighting cancer than all the others?
- ceejayoz 5y agoSomeone does a couple hundred necroscopies of dead individuals and finds no cancer deaths and decides to go digging, I suspect. There are captive colonies of the things, as they're more obviously interesting in a variety of ways.
- akiselev 5y agoContact inhibition is among the most studied topics in biology due to its significance in cancer formation, aging, dermatology, etc. Scientists are always on the look out for species with interesting adaptations. The general process goes: naturalists, zoologists, etc gather data on a species. Oncology/aging/whatever researcher notices a peculiar data point - in this case the naked mole rats' extreme longevity compared to other rodents - and investigates. The peculiar data points (lifespan, rate of cancer, etc.) percolate until someone stumbles on a plausible mechanism [1]. Rodents reproduce like crazy so it wouldn't take long to notice. [1] https://www.pnas.org/content/106/46/19352 https://www.pnas.org/content/106/46/19352