contagious reticulum cell sarcoma

{{Short description|Disease in Syrian hamsters}}

Contagious reticulum cell sarcoma is a reticulum-cell sarcoma{{cite journal | doi=10.1093/jnci/26.4.949 | title=A Contagious Tumor of the Hamster | journal=JNCI: Journal of the National Cancer Institute | year=1961 }} found in Syrian hamsters{{cite journal | vauthors = Copper HL, Mackay CM, Banfield WG | title = Chromosome studies of a contagious reticulum cell sarcoma of the Syrian hamster | journal = Journal of the National Cancer Institute | volume = 33 | issue = 4 | pages = 691–706 | date = October 1964 | pmid = 14220251 | doi = 10.1093/jnci/33.4.691 }} that can be transmitted from one hamster to another.{{cite journal | doi=10.1093/jnci/33.4.691 | title=Chromosome Studies of a Contagious Reticulum Cell Sarcoma of the Syrian Hamster | journal=JNCI: Journal of the National Cancer Institute | year=1964 }} It was first described in 1945.{{cite journal | doi=10.1038/155607b0 | title=Spontaneous Transmissible Tumours in the Syrian Hamster | year=1945 | last1=Ashbel | first1=R. | journal=Nature | volume=155 | issue=3942 | page=607 | bibcode=1945Natur.155..607A | s2cid=4084173 | doi-access=free }}

Transmission from hamster to hamster can be through various mechanisms. It has been seen to spread within a laboratory population, presumably through gnawing at tumours and cannibalism.{{cite journal | doi=10.1016/j.tig.2015.10.001 | title=Transmissible Tumors: Breaking the Cancer Paradigm | year=2016 | last1=Ostrander | first1=Elaine A. | last2=Davis | first2=Brian W. | last3=Ostrander | first3=Gary K. | journal=Trends in Genetics | volume=32 | issue=1 | pages=1–15 | pmid=26686413 | pmc=4698198 }} It can also be spread by means of the bite of the mosquito Aedes aegypti.{{cite journal | vauthors = Banfield WG, Woke PA, Mackay CM, Cooper HL | title = Mosquito transmission of a reticulum cell sarcoma of hamsters | journal = Science | volume = 148 | issue = 3674 | pages = 1239–40 | date = May 1965 | pmid = 14280009 | doi = 10.1126/science.148.3674.1239 | bibcode = 1965Sci...148.1239B | s2cid = 12611674 }}

It is one of only three known transmissible cancers in mammals; the others are devil facial tumor disease, a cancer which occurs in Tasmanian devils, and canine transmissible venereal tumor in dogs and other canines. Unlike these other two, tumours with multiple, independent origins have been observed in laboratory populations of hamsters.