News

Two TCG members, Alex Sampson and Andrea Strakova, have recently returned from a field trip in Belize. Alex and Andrea worked with vets and volunteers at the Hopkins Belize Humane Society (HBHS), Animal Medical Centre, Paw’s Veterinary Clinic, Roaring Creek Veterinary Clinic, Stann Creek Animal Hospital, Punta Gorda Humane Society and the Belize Wi…

Read the story about how a roadkill Tasmanian devil triggered Elizabeth Murchison's interest in transmissible cancers. The story, "Cancer in the wilderness", was published in Cell.

Four additional transmissible cancers have been discovered in marine bivalves - one of which appears to have jumped between species. Read more here:http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature18455.html

A short video describing our work on the genetics of canine transmissible venereal tumour - the world’s oldest cancer - which was published in eLife today, can be found here. We hope that you will find it interesting!

Using genetics, scientists at the TCG show how the world’s oldest cancer “metastasised” through the global dog population in an article published today ineLife.Thanks to dedicated help from our veterinary collaborators based all over the world, we collected and analysed canine transmissible venereal tumour (CTVT) samples collected from over 400 dog…

Many congratulations to TCG member Maximilian Stammnitz, who has been awarded a prestigious Gates Cambridge Scholarship! Gates Scholarships are extraordinarily competitive, so this is a huge achievement. More information about the 2016 class of Gates Cambridge Scholars can be found here:https://www.gatescambridge.org/our-scholars/new-scholars

Here is an inspirational true story of the young female dog Missy who made a full recovery from her severe CTVT cancer, thanks for the treatment and care  provided by Animal Aid Unlimited.http://animalaidunlimited.org/blog/dog-with-massive-cancerous-tumor-recovers/

We have a new opening for a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the TCG. This is an exciting opportunity to genetically analyse hundreds of tumours derived from transmissible cancer lineages in dogs and Tasmanian devils. The deadline for applications is 28th March 2016.Application forms and more information are found here:http://www.jobs.cam.ac.uk/j…

TCG research was mentioned in a recent article in the New York Times, speculating about transmissible cancers in humans... http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/23/science/scientists-ponder-the-prospect-of-contagious-cancer.html?_r=1

Last week (1st-5th February) I had the privilege of visiting the TCG group at the Department of Veterinary Medicine in Cambridge, UK.I had an awesome week!In my normal life I am a vet who works for a welfare organisation in Port Elizabeth, South Africa. I work in a small clinic where I deal with vaccinations, basic treatment of animal illness and i…

Dr Mirjam van der Wel, from Animal Anti-Cruelty League (AACL) South Africa, came to visit TCG last week. Mirjam is a collaborator of our ongoing CTVT projects and had sent us hundreds of CTVT samples in the past few years. She spent a week with TCG members and investigated the journey of CTVT tissue samples from the biopsy to genomic DNA sequencing…

Over the past three weeks, our enthusiastic TCG members have been on a field excursion to Australia’s southernmost state: ’Tassie devil’s habitat. With the recent discovery of a second DFTD lineage, their intention was to conduct a preliminary field assessment of the spread DFT2 and meet local collaborators of the Save the Devil program.Bringing Ta…

Scientists at the TCG, together with collaborators at the University of Tasmania and the Save the Tasmanian Devil Program, have discovered a second transmissible cancer in Tasmanian devils. This second cancer, known as Devil Facial Tumour 2 (DFT2), causes tumours that are grossly indistinguishable from the first-discovered transmissible cancer in T…

The 2015 TCG Christmas Party was complete with German mulled wine, Chinese dumplings, Korean pickled cabbage pancakes, Czech spinach pastry, an Irish casserole, a brussels sprouts extravaganza and, most importantly, a TCG cake (see photo)! There was also a visit by Secret Santa, who brought lots of interesting gifts, including a shining reindeer no…

Karina Ferreira de Castro, a PhD student from São Paulo State University who visited the TCG in 2014, has successfully defended her PhD thesis in Brazil. Karina is also a veterinary oncologist, who regularly treats CTVT cases. Her thesis was entitled “Canine transmissible venereal tumour – I. Gene and protein expression and genotypic characterizati…