A Tale of mothballs, worms and cancer

Link to Science

I love stories of accidental discoveries in science. It takes an observant eye and analytical mind to see events as they are. This one is about mothballs and worms. The chance meeting of the two led to a discovery of how mothballs(yiks common household stuff) can cause cancer in C.elegans (a nematode, worm) through deactivation of a caspase enzyme(a protein that activates a cell to self-destruct when old, unlike cancer cells which go on living). Hmmm no wonder I never liked the smell of those stuff….