ScienceDaily (July 2, 2009) — The salamander is a superhero of regeneration, able to replace lost limbs, damaged lungs, sliced spinal cord — even bits of lopped-off brain.


The axolotl salamander (Ambystoma mexicanum). The salamander is a superhero of regeneration, able to replace lost limbs, damaged lungs, sliced spinal cord — even bits of lopped-off brain. (Credit: iStockphoto/Armin Hinterwirth)

But it turns out that remarkable ability isn’t so mysterious after all — suggesting that researchers could learn how to replicate it in people.

Scientists had long credited the diminutive amphibious creature’s outsized capabilities to "pluripotent" cells that, like human embryonic stem cells, have the uncanny ability to morph into whatever appendage, organ or tissue happens to be needed or due for a replacement.

But in a paper set to appear July 2 in the journal Nature, a team of seven researchers, including a University of Florida zoologist, debunks that notion. Based on experiments on genetically modified axolotl salamanders, the researchers show that cells from the salamander’s different tissues retain the "memory" of those tissues when they regenerate, contributing with few exceptions only to the same type of tissue from whence they came.

Standard mammal stem cells operate the same way, albeit with far less dramatic results — they can heal wounds or knit bone together, but not regenerate a limb or rebuild a spinal cord. What’s exciting about the new findings is they suggest that harnessing the salamander’s regenerative wonders is at least within the realm of possibility for human medical science.

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