The researchers thus went on to study the expression of Wnt
genes during regeneration, and found that different members of the gene family were active at different locations across the planarian's head - to - tail axis.
Not exact matches
The researchers used the worm's genomic information to study how
gene expression changed
during regeneration.
We found that several
genes that were previously implicated in cell division were also upregulated
during various stages of
regeneration.»
In the case of planarians, the
gene egr - 4 seems to perform an early control of cell proliferation as a response to amputation, and be involved later in the early differentiation of brain
during regeneration.
«We have already observed that
gene egr - 4 is regulated by the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) signaling pathway, so it will enable to identify also the factors that activate this pathway
during anterior
regeneration.
The researchers used a technique called RNA interference (RNAi) to screen a group of
genes known to be involved in animal development, in order to study the signaling mechanisms that regulate whether the animal would produce a head or tail
during regeneration.
The finding suggests that these varied Wnt
genes regulate Smed - beta - catenin - 1 activity to provide the positional information by which the organism specifies the location of its head and tail
during regeneration.
Now researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies have identified an essential cellular pathway in zebrafish that paves the way for limb
regeneration by unlocking
gene expression patterns last seen
during embryonic development.
Since
regeneration recapitulates in broad strokes embryonic development,
during which a complex multi-cellular organism develops from a handful of embryonic stem cells, the researchers began by comparing
gene expression patterns between the two processes.
In the more immediate future, the team plans to use global approaches to identify all the targets of Kdm6b.1
during regeneration, and to find out what gives the signal to turn these
genes off when
regeneration is complete.