Ants detect cancer cells through volatile organic compounds

iScience

Brigitte Bourachot¹  Paul Devienne²  Patrizia d’Ettorre³  Fatima Mechta-Grigoriou³  Baptiste Piqueret³  Jean-Christophe Sandoz⁴  Chloé Leroy⁴ 

[1] Corresponding author;Inserm, U830, Paris F-75248, France;Laboratoire d'Ethologie Expérimentale et Comparée UR 4443 (LEEC), Université Sorbonne Paris Nord, 93430 Villetaneuse, France;Stress and Cancer Laboratory, Institut Curie, PSL Research University, Equipe labelisée Ligue Nationale Contre le Cancer, 26, rue d’Ulm, 75248 Paris Cedex 05, France;

关键词: Biological sciences;    Cell biology;    Cancer;   

DOI  :  

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

Summary: Cancer is among the world’s leading causes of death. A critical challenge for public health is to develop a noninvasive, inexpensive, and efficient tool for early cancer detection. Cancer cells are characterized by an altered metabolism, producing unique patterns of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) that can be used as cancer biomarkers. Dogs can detect VOCs via olfactory associative learning, but training dogs is costly and time-consuming. Insects, such as ants, have a refined sense of smell and can be rapidly trained. We show that individual ants need only a few training trials to learn, memorize, and reliably detect the odor of human cancer cells. These performances rely on specific VOC patterns, as shown by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry. Our findings suggest that using ants as living tools to detect biomarkers of human cancer is feasible, fast, and less laborious than using other animals.

【 授权许可】

Unknown