It Might Get Messy

It Might Get Messy

Last week we celebrated the test results showing that the tumor-looking growth in my throat was not, in fact, cancerous, and discussed the interesting, if to-date-not-particularly-useful fact that naked mole rats possess a couple of genes coding for proteins that suppress tumor development and so are generally immune to cancers.

In a novel, Perdido Street Station, whose premise is so imaginatively bizarre as to question its author’s (China Mieville) educational, if not biological, background in the same world as the rest of us, the storyline hinges on the captive growth and feeding of a particular larval moth. Insects, like mole rats, it devolves, have important lessons to teach us about cancer. 

Some insects like moths, butterflies, beetles, and others undergo complete metamorphosis—that is, they hatch from an egg, begin life as a distinctly different larval form, totally remix and re-batch their bodily fluids inside a quiescent pupa, and finally emerge as a totally newly structured adult. This is physically bizarre. It is equivalent to taking a puppy, say, a few months old, popping it into an industrial-strength stainless steel blender set on “frappe”, whirling it into a froth, then pouring it into a Mason jar and letting it sit on the counter for a couple months until the contents reconfigure themselves into, say, a cuttlefish or maybe a squid, and slurping itself away into the nearest estuary. Like I say, bizarre. 

The gooey fluid in the insect pupa converts itself to the awesomely complicated structure of an adult via organizing structures called “imaginal disks”. These disks float free in the tissue goop, and when and as appropriate times come, they direct the conversion of proteins and other chemicals in the pupal slop from goo to adult insect. 

It turns out, even if the pupa is starved (this figures in an angular way in Mieville’s novel, BTW), the imaginal disks continue to direct growth—they keep on keeping on, transitioning the preinsectoid soup into insect. In this, they act much like tumors. One of the interesting properties of many cancers is their inherent ability to pirate materials for and prioritize their own growth (and growth of necessary ancillary tissues like directed blood supply) at the expense of other tissues that would otherwise step into proper position-of-priority as growth materials become available. 

Except for a hard-stop substance called juvenile hormone. When juvenile hormone shows up in the soup, the imaginal disks coordinate their development, behave themselves as proper physiological components, and properly and calmly perform their necessary functions. It turns out, even in starved pupae, juvenile hormone makes a rather heroic effort to show up in time to try to help transform the developing insect into a functional adult with whatever resources are available, rather than giving the imaginal disks free range to expropriate and expend whatever resources of matter and energy they can grab.

The lesson, my friends, is that information is important. Really, really important. Information—like that inherent in juvenile hormone—trumps brute-force physiological hijacking. A smart system is a healthy, persistent system. We might say, a non-cancerous system. This week I’ve added a new weapon to my personal arsenal of anti-cancer weaponry. A deep dislike for inherent stupidity. Oh, I’ve always had that particular personality quirk. Just never had a real use for it before. Now I got one. Cancer? It’s not just evil, painful, disgusting, and inhumane—it’s stupid. So there. Take that. 

Next up? Maybe I’ll just find a way to work an ancient Sicilian symbol indicating the recipient’s mother’s relationship to various hoofed animals into a pre-surgery ritual for application in nontraditional cancer treatment centers. That you cancer? Really? You sure? ‘cause I got your marones right here, awright? Awright!