Abstract
Planarians are flatworms capable of whole-body regeneration, able to regrow any missing body part after injury or amputation. The extraordinary regenerative capacity of planarians is based upon the presence in the adult of a large population of somatic pluripotent stem cells. These cells, called neoblasts, offer a unique system to study the process of stem cell specification and differentiation in vivo. In recent years, FACS-based isolation of neoblasts, RNAi functional analyses as well as high-throughput approaches such as single-cell sequencing have allowed a rapid progress in our understanding of many different aspects of neoblast biology. Here, we summarize our current knowledge on the molecular signatures that define planarian neoblasts heterogeneity, which includes a percentage of truly pluripotent stem cells, and guide the commitment of pluripotent ne-oblasts into lineage-specific progenitor cells, as well as their differentiation into specific planarian cell types.
Original language | English |
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Article number | 1532 |
Number of pages | 23 |
Journal | Biomolecules |
Volume | 11 |
Issue number | 10 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - Oct 2021 |
Externally published | Yes |
Keywords
- Differentiation
- Neoblasts
- Piwi
- Planarian
- Progenitors
- Regeneration
- Schmidtea mediterranea
- Specification
- Stem cells