The best animals having higher population rates are now on a harmful stake. According to a new study evolved by a group of scientists from the Griffith University, the Tasmanian devils are taken down by severe cell damage based disease. A new sort of facial tumor has taken the lives of the majority of the devils. The study also revealed some of the dangerous yet surprising facts of this deadliest infection, by which one can easily understand the characteristics of this disease.
According to Phys Org, the study, which was recently published in the scientific journal "Ecology Letters", hinted that the devils which are infected by devil facial tumor disease (DFTD) have the higher chance of reproductive cell induced death than the uninfected once. It was earlier thought that comparatively older, younger and less healthy devils which hold the lesser chance for the creation of antibodies inwards their cell systems. But what was unveiled by the scientific study was shocking in terms of all previous and obvious thoughts. It hinted that the infection sports more chance to hit those devils which are relatively fit and healthy than others.
While clarifying the wired characteristic of DFTD, the lead researcher in the study Dr. Konstans Wells of Griffith's Environmental Futures Research Institute (EFRI) predicted a possible reason for this condition. According to Science Newsline, she said that this nature of the tumor is probably due to the disease's mode of transmission among socially dominant individuals. However, some other researchers also indicated more insights about DFTD as well.
Professor Hamish McCallum, belonging from EFRI said "it shows that animals which are otherwise very "fit" (in the evolutionary sense) are exactly the ones that the disease takes out." Many researchers also claimed that individuals once resistant to the disease can drastically evolve to be infected by it
