Sydney (Australia), 17 feb (EFE).-the preservation of the Tasmanian Devil, an animal marsupial endangered species that inhabits the South Australia, outlines possible following that scientists have desentrañado keys of tumors that decimate the species.
The enigma of this strange cancer is lower since a team of experts headed by biologist Janine Deakin of the Australian National University compared the genome of a demon or Tasmanian Devil healthy with a copy affected by this rare disease, which spreads rapidly through contact.
Researchers found that “several important fragments of chromosomes had been mixed as a puzzle which has armed the wrong way”, according to a statement released by the University.
Before, in a study published in February this year in the scientific journal PLOS Genetics, the Deakin team revealed that tumors affecting the Tasmanian Devil (Sarcophilus laniarius) they evolve slowly and have changed very little since its appearance.
“It is unusual because the cancer usually, in the case of human cancer rapidly evolving and there are large differences between the original tumor and metastasis,” said Deakin.
The head of the school of biological research of the University emphasized that through research “we have confirmed that the type of tumor that are copies of Tasmanian Devil is genetically very stable”.
Called “Purinina” by Aboriginal people, this carnivorous marsupial which is considered the oldest in the world between those who remain on Earth, disappeared from the continental Australia about 400 years ago, apparently by the loss of its Habitat to the dingo, a wild dog with a high reproduction rate.
Currently, the devil is only found in the wild in areas of the island of Tasmania and several specialized centers created in the continent to isolate healthy specimens of animals affected by the disease.
Alarm jumped in the mid 1990s when it detected that this animal died because of a cancerous facial tumour that affects only this species.
Experts estimate that 70 percent of copies of Tasmanian Devil die before reaching 18 months of life from cancer and of the changes in the ecosystem above all by the introduction of invasive, such as the Red Fox species.
The Tasmanian Devil, which often contracted the illness through the wounds that occur in fights with infected specimens, begins to manifest visible symptoms of this cancer with the appearance in the mouth of tumors that increase in size to cause some deformations that prevent the animal to eat to survive.
This Carnivore is included in the national list of animals in danger of extinction Australia and also in the Red of United Nations to consider list that in a period of 25 to 35 years can disappear if before is not a cure for cancer that decimated the species.
According to experts, an eventual extinction of this animal will cause an imbalance in the ecosystem of Tasmania because that will be a considerable increase of carrion in the forested areas of the island and allow the multiplication of so-called invasive species.
The next step of Australian scientists is to decipher the origin and causes of the disease, not only to save the animal from extinction, but also in order that their study provides advances in the research of cancer in humans.
“Cancer affecting Tasmanian Devil is going to be a model to study various types of cancer suffer from human because it is stable, develops slowly and provides a better chance to find particularities that are not appreciated by studying cancer in humans because everything happens very fast,” emphasized.
In general, cancer is not contagious because cancer cells are different among those affected, and when they are transmitted are rejected by the immune system.
Images provided today, Friday 17/02/2012, by Australian Government agencies on a healthy Tasmanian Devil and another suffering from the cancer that decimated the species, whose genetic keys just be rooted out by scientists. The photo on the left, showing a healthy Tasmanian Devil, has been transferred by the Department of Primary Industries, Parks, Water and Environment of Australia and the right hand, that shows an ill animal, of the Australian National University. EFE
