Anne-Maree Pearse

University of Tasmania 2012 Prince Hitachi PrizeAnne-Maree Pearse is an Australian cytogeneticist who is credited with the theory that some cancer cells can be transmissible between individuals.

[1] She was unable to complete her PhD due to symptoms of progressive and severe degenerative disc disease.

As a result, they proposed the hypothesis that "the disease is transmitted by allograft, whereby an infectious cell line is passed directly between the animals through bites they inflict on one another.".

[7] Since then, other scientists have added further evidence to the Allograft Theory of DFTD whilst Pearse has continued to uncover new information on the disease.

[9] The conclusion of this research is "that DFTD should not be treated as a static entity, but rather as an evolving parasite with epigenetic plasticity".