Specialized progenitors and regeneration
Year: 2013
Type: review
Abstract: Planarians are flatworms capable of regenerating all body parts. Planarian regeneration requires neoblasts, a population of dividing cells that has been studied for over a century. Neoblast progeny generate new cells of blastemas, which are the regenerative outgrowths at wounds. If the neoblasts comprise a uniform population of cells during regeneration (e.g. they are all uncommitted and pluripotent), then specialization of new cell types should occur in multipotent, non-dividing neoblast progeny cells. By contrast, recent data indicate that some neoblasts express lineage-specific transcription factors during regeneration and in uninjured animals. These observations raise the possibility that an important early step in planarian regeneration is the specialization of neoblasts to produce specified rather than naïve blastema cells.
Source: Development
DOI: 10.1242/dev.080499
Author: Peter W. Reddien
Language: English
Subfield: Molecular Biology
Domain: Life Sciences
Open Access status: green
Funder: Howard Hughes Medical Institute
OpenAlex ID: W1990408483