Molecular mechanisms of vertebrate regeneration

Regeneration of body part occurs in many, but not all, animals in Nature. Why some animals can regenerate and others cannot is an important question in biology, and may eventually be applicable to human medicine. The Tanaka laboratory has investigated the regenerative capabilities of the axolotl salamander and defined the regenerative cells, and injury signals that cause adult cells to become stem cells. With the support of the Wittgenstein award, the Tanaka laboratory will investigate how adult cells turn into stem cells and apply this knowledge investigate what is different about mammalian cells that prevents regeneration. They will also investigate how nerve cells find their correct connections during limb regeneration and what happens if regeneration is unsuccessful and nerves do not find their correct target. Reinnervation of muscle is the process by which nerves damaged due to injury, find their way back to their muscle fiber targets. The process of muscle reinnervation is not optimal in mammals with dire lifetime consequences for those suffering from imprecise motor neuron growth after injury. The innovative experiments proposed here elucidate how motor neurons successfully reinnervate their original targets post-injury in the axolotl, a salamander whose limbs are comparable to humans yet show powerful regenerative abilities and is now highly accessible to transgenesis, live imaging, and cell transplantation allowing us to eventually develop effective methods of reinnervation during nerve surgery with the aspiration of a fully functional and complete recovery.

No additional funding sources recorded.