Naked mole rats are very cool, but they may not be immune to cancers

Naked mole rats are curious things, and undeniably cool. With their hairless, wrinkly bodies, oversized teeth and tiny eyes, they have been described by one scientists as "sabre-toothed sausages". Their physiology is also unique in the animal kingdom: they live exceptionally long lives (for their size); they don't feel certain kinds of pain; they can survive for long periods without oxygen, using a system previously only observed in plants; they live in complex, multi-generational colonies similar to ants and bees; and it is thought that they may be immune to cancers, and certainly show much fewer cancers than other animals as they age.
It is this last feature which has made them so interesting to scientists, but those cancer claims are now under fierce debate. Most of the claims date from a 2013 US-led study which found that cancer-causing genes introduced into naked mole rat cells did not result in cancers, whereas when introduced into mice they did. However, a new University of Cambridge study published in the journal Nature, using those same genetically-engineered naked mole rat cells, showed that cancers did develop when they were transplanted, throwing the initial conclusions into doubt.
The Cambridge study's conclusion was that the original 2013 study used problematic cell selection techniques. The US-led team have fired back that the Cambridge study introduced new variables into the test, and is thus unreliable. They further argues that using the original 7-year old cell cultures is also misleading as mutations may have accumulated over the years. It's all getting a little heated, and the jury seems to be out.
It does, though, show the value of constantly re-evaluating science, and the risks of trusting one-off studies.