Hyaluronic acid protects against cancer
Naked Diggers' resistance to cancer linked to hyaluronic acid
In fact, they discovered it a long time ago – at least, in April last year, they reported and talked about their discovery, their intention to create transgenic mice, etc. on the sidelines of the international conference "Genetics of Aging and Life Expectancy". And now we have published the results in one of the most prestigious scientific journals – VM.
The work of biologists (Tian et al., High-molecular-mass hyaluronan mediates the cancer resistance of the naked mole rat) is published in the journal Nature, Nature News (Simple molecule prevents mole rats from getting cancer) briefly writes about it.
According to Seluyanov, the discovery was made almost by chance: the researchers noticed that hyaluronic acid in naked diggers has an unusually long length due to the increased viscosity of the culture fluid in which the cells were grown. The liquid was so viscous that it periodically clogged the pipes in the laboratory.
When scientists decided to figure out the nature of such viscosity, it turned out that the hyaluronic acid molecules of naked diggers are more than five times longer than the corresponding molecules of mice. This, in turn, turned out to be due to a special sequence of the enzyme producing the extracellular polymer (HAS2) and a reduced activity of enzymes that destroy it. When scientists turned off HAS2 in the digger cells and transplanted them into the mouse body, such cells began to form tumors. Similarly, cells with artificially increased synthesis of the enzyme that destroys hyaluronic acid (HYAL2) behaved in the same way. At the same time, ordinary digger cells never form tumors during transplantation (and in their own body).
According to Seluyanov, long hyaluronic acid in diggers does not allow cells to reach increased density during division. As the researcher noted earlier in an interview for the "Tape.ru", cell cultures of diggers, unlike other mammals, never close, do not form a monolayer. The formation of a tumor is very often preceded by the "crowding" of cells, so its prevention can be considered as one of the additional barriers to carcinogenesis.
In a comment to Nature, a Russian-born scientist said that the laboratory is now working on creating transgenic mice that would synthesize the same long hyaluronic acid as the diggers. If an increase in the length of the extracellular polymer itself will have a therapeutic effect, then it can potentially be achieved without the involvement of transgenes: for example, with the help of inhibitors of the corresponding hydrolases.
Naked diggers are known for their unusually long lifespan, which often exceeds 30 years – almost 10 times longer than the corresponding mouse size. In addition, tumors never form in their bodies, and the animals themselves are not sensitive to chemical burns.
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru20.06.2013