On the death of the myth of the bare digger: but still, he is aging

In the photo: naked excavator, the favorite of gerontologists.

Myths - a stubborn thing. Often they resolutely refuse to die even when there is a mass of evidence to refute them. Like the myth that the Earth is flat, or the falsification of the American landing on the moon.

Why is that? Why even when Google and Snopes.com have been around for a long time, we occasionally meet tearful posts about “the last words of Steve Jobs” or other outright lies? Apparently, because our brains believe in something pleasant overpowers the unpleasant and energy-intensive process of comprehensive analysis of the information received.

But it is necessary to analyze. Because myths are killing. Take a look at the death terrorists. Believing in the myth of 72 Gurias, they are ready to kill themselves and bring death to others. But if they had bothered to spend at least a couple of hours in Google analyzing all the pros and cons, they most likely realized that there was no more reason to blow themselves up than to wait for a gift from Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy.

Gerontology also has its own myths. One of them is about the potential immortality or non-aging of a naked digger . That he, they say, as the Terminator, is not subject to cancer or age-related changes, and dies solely from external causes. Here are a couple of articles from the top search engines for illustration:

www.popmech.ru/science/235670-golyy-zemlekop-zhivotnoe-kotoroe-ne-stareet



paranormal-news.ru/news/tajna_bessmertija_i_golye_zemlekopy/2015-01-15-10360

But this, alas, is not so. The bare digger is subject to cancer, jade, sarcopenia, and cataracts. And he lives in the laboratory for about 29-30 years. His record for the maximum life expectancy was set in 2010 at the turn of 32 years , and has not yet been beaten.

The myth that naked land committees do not get cancer is also already debunked. Here in this article 4 (or even 5) cases of cancer (out of 37 analyzed) are described:

Four Cases of Spontaneous Neoplasia in the Naked Mole-Rat (Heterocephalus glaber)

J Gerontol A Biol Sci Med Sci. 2017 Jan; 72 (1): 38-43. Epub 2016 Apr 29.

And here are 2 more:

Initial Case Reports of Cancer in Naked Mole-rats (Heterocephalus glaber). - PubMed - NCBI

Vet Pathol. 2016 May; 53 (3): 691-6. doi: 10.1177 / 0300985816630796. Epub 2016 Feb 4.

In this article, the researchers report that more than half of the diggers have nephritis with age, and in 9% the kidneys fail completely:

During a 15-year retrospective population zoo-housed population, there were 138 (92%) adult NMRs. Of these, renal tubular mineralization was very common (115 of 127; 90.6%) and found in NMRs without concurrent renal lesions (36 of 127; 28.3%). Nephritis or nephropathy, and diagnosed in 73 of 127 (57.5%), while there was a process of NMRs.

Also, a great many cattlers develop cataracts :

Interestingly, we have seen NMRs ranging from 4 to 20 years of age ( Figure S2A ).

At the same time, it is very strange that the myth of non-aging of a digger continues to live in 2017, despite the fact that as early as 2011, a work was published showing that old excavators have a whole range of age-related pathologies - heart, kidney, liver, etc .:

Images from the keynote (29–30 years) naked mole rats (NMRs), stained with hematoxylin and eosin, reveal that there are many animals.

• (A) Aged NMR heart. Although it was observed, it was possible to observe the cardiac aging. Myocardiocytes are branched striated muscle cells, with one or two nuclei. Several enlarged myocardial nuclei (arrows) are 2 to 4 times larger than those of myocardiocyte nuclei in young animals. Lipofuscin pigment (arrow tips) is visible in original fashion (original magnifi cation 1000x).
• (B) Aged NMR liver. Yellow-gold intracellular pigment accumulation (arrows) is likely to be lipofuscin in hepatocytes. Degeneration of hepatocytes is characterized by variably sized cells. Hepatocytes contain both lipofuscin and iron pigment (arrows).
• (C) One large nucleus contains an invagination of the cytoplasm. Arrows represent accumulation of lipofuscin pigments, which are common in aged animals.
• (D) Aged NMR kidney. In the medulla of the kidney, a large focus of mineral (M) is present. Several areas of the interstitium demonstrate fibrosis (between arrows). Medullary tubules (T) are present (original magnification 200x).
• (E) A glomerulus increased mesangium in the tuft and increased fibrosis around the capsule. It is a part of the renal aging process (original magnification 400x).
• (F) Aged NMR eye. The low magnitude of the lens (L) is relative to the size of the lens. The retina ® is detached, with some fusion of the retinal nuclear layers. The optic nerve (N) is present but much smaller than that of similar-sized rodents.
• (G) It can be seen from the bottom of the wall and it can be seen. These are hallmarks of retinal degeneration.
• (H) The high magnification (400x) of the lens cells is (B) adjacent to the lens capsule (C). This shows the development of cataracts in the aged NMR.

So, it turns out that the excavator is naked! That is aging. Just slow and very uneven (demonstrating the compression of morbidity, a favorite of gerontologists). But it’s still faster than the more mysterious Brandt Nightclub, which has lived for more than 40 years, despite the fact that it is 4–5 times smaller.