UIdaho, WSU study cancer that’s killing tasmanian devils

Over the past 20 years, tens of thousands of the world’s Tasmanian devils have died of a contagious cancer that spreads when the animals bite each other.

Scientists predicted the cancer, devil facial tumor disease, would drive the species to extinction — but a new study from the University of Idaho, Washington State University and the University of Tasmania shows Tasmanian devils are evolving rapidly in response to the threat. The study was published today in Nature Communications .

Paul Hohenlohe , an assistant professor of biological sciences in the UI College of Science, contributed to the project his expertise in searching for signs of evolutionary change across animal genomes, the full set of genes in an organism’s DNA. More here.