“Antibodies that contribute to cancer avoidance could be given to cancer patients or those at high risk of cancer, and those that lead to cancer could be removed from patients or those who do not have it yet,” says Bastard. “And if we find antibodies associated with the later occurrence of cancer, we could have a simple test that could prevent or detect cancer earlier.”
Bastard stresses that, while he believes autoantibodies could increase or reduce cancer risks, individuals can still improve their chances of avoiding cancer by, for example, stopping smoking, reducing alcohol intake and enjoying the sun safely.
Learning the secrets of animal super-avoiders
Not all super-avoiders are human. Scientists have identified some animals that have evolved strategies to keep cancer at bay. They hope that learning their tricks could lead to a better understanding of the causes of the disease in humans, as well as improved treatments and prevention strategies.
Cancer risk should increase with an organism’s size and age, but this isn’t always the case. This observation – called Peto’s paradox – was first made by epidemiologist Richard Peto in the 1970s. Bowhead whales, for example, rarely get cancer, despite sometimes growing to more than 19 metres in length and living beyond 200 years. And naked mole rats, while only 10 to 20 centimetres long, seem almost immune to cancer.
In 2022, evolutionary biologist Dr Alex Cagan, of the Wellcome Sanger Institute, University of Cambridge and the Cancer Research UK Cambridge Centre, showed that genetic mutations accumulate more slowly in longer-lived animal species.
Cagan hopes that useful lessons can be learned by tracking what happens in cancer-avoiding animals when cancer-causing genetic mutations occur.
“Evolution has essentially been running cancer prevention trials for millions of years in different species,” he says. “If we can figure out the mechanisms that species are using, we can think about whether there are ways to mimic those mechanisms with therapeutics and lifestyle interventions.”
Unearthing the secrets of super-avoiders could open entirely new paths in the fight against cancer.
Listen now: hear more about “super avoiders” and other groundbreaking research changing the future of cancer medicine, on a very special branded episode of The Rest Is Science podcast, in partnership with Cancer Research UK
