Comments on: Gene ‘cancer-proofs’ rodent’s cells

By: Jenny Leonard

Jenny Leonard — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 09:01:13 +0000

The full text is available here: http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2009/10/23/0905252106.full.pdf+html.

By: sam del mundo

sam del mundo — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 01:48:24 +0000

Thanks for your reply. i’ve only been able to read your abstract (in PNAS), somehow, the whole article doesn’t come up.. so if you don’t mind one or two follow up questions.. IF ‘p16′ refers to a ca. 16 kD protein, can one obtain sufficient material to do say, an terminal AA sequence, and design anti-sense oligos from that?
And while it was not entirely clear to me (from the abstract), if p16 is part of the p53 pathway. wouldn’t simple mutations of p53 show up in ‘cancer’ of the mole rat (regardless of the presence of ‘good’ p16)? And while i can appreciate the role of p16 in ‘solid’ tumours, has anybody tried to induce, say, a leukemia in the mole rat?
i guess i am somewhat ‘bothered’ by the absence of any kind of ‘cancer’ in a multi-cellular organism (regardless of the ‘robustness’ of p16, etc.).
But very fascinating work..and good luck with your future studies. cpacibo.
sam

By: Vera Gorbunova

Vera Gorbunova — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 16:52:49 +0000

We are working on it. The genome of naked mole rat is not sequenced, therefore before we can mutate or even just silence a gene we need to clone it. We hope that with publication of this paper the NIH will be more willing to invest in sequencing of the naked mole rat genome.

By: sam del mundo

sam del mundo — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 02:58:11 +0000

The obvious question: Have they tried to mutate the p16? and results??

By: sally

sally — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 14:03:19 +0000

how simply amazing. I have become deaf to hearing cancer research results as while they are interesting, they all seem to tinker around the edges. But this seems like a whole new way to think about the situation. maybe?

By: Genes as Quiet as a Mouse: Why These Butt-Ugly Rodents Don’t Get Cancer | Sustainable Suppers

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 10:53:53 +0000

[...] more about the study here, in Futurity, a fantastic new science news aggregator that publishes studies from various universities. [...]