SCIENCE IN THE NEWS DAILY
Genetic Discovery Promises Healing Without Scars
from the Guardian (UK)
Human regeneration has to date been the preserve of science fiction. But mammals may have a dormant ability to regrow healthy tissue, research suggests, possibly paving the way for scar-free healing at some point in the future. Biologists believe that a gene called p21 may hold the key to spontaneous healing, which could allow limited regeneration of the human body, as witnessed in newts, flatworms and the hydra.
It is thought that in mammals this healing potential has been lost through evolution, but may lie dormant in cells and could be reactivated by switching off the p21 gene. Mice engineered in the laboratory to lack the p21 gene, were able to renew surgically removed tissue so that no trace of an injury remained.
Removing p21 causes adult cells to behave like stem cells--those cells in embryos with a "pluripotent" power to become any kind of tissue. In experiments, mice which were missing the gene had holes punched into their ears (as commonly done to identify lab animals), but after a few weeks all traces of the ear holes had disappeared.
Read more...
Science in the Media
Newspapers:
Magazines and Web Sites:
The Science-Media Intersection:
Subscribe to Our Content!
Visit our RSS Feeds page to choose among 13 customized feeds, or create a free My AmSci account to request an email notice whenever a specified author, department or discipline appears online.