Regeneration;
Humans have very limited regenerative capacity. For the most part, when a human tissue or organ is damaged or removed, it is lost forever. The inability to regenerate is shared by many species, including mammals. In humans, this represents a significant medical problem, as the inability to regenerate is the fundamental mechanism underlying many degenerative diseases, including cardiovascular disease, neurodegenerative diseases and aging. Inadequate regenerative capacity is an obvious problem in the setting of acute injury.
By contrast with humans, several organisms have remarkable regenerative abilities. Teleost fish such as zebrafish and urodele amphibians like the newt are two vertebrate organisms that faithfully regenerate many organs and tissues, including skin, bone, joints, nerves, arteries, veins, muscle, limbs (fins), spinal cord, eyes and heart. The secret of their remarkable abilities resides in their genes. The goal of our work is to identify important regeneration genes and use this information to create the molecular and central mechanisms underlying this remarkable phenomenon.