Cell development is reversed

After years of setbacks, researcher Mark Keating has taken a giant step toward understanding the potential for regrowth of limbs and organs. He and his colleagues have managed to manipulate fully developed mouse muscle cells to the point where they revert to stem cells, uncommitted cells capable of growing into any type of cell. Further, he coaxed these cells into starting their lives over again as bone, cartilage, and fat cells. In other words, he did what everyone thought was impossible. "It's work that should change the way people think about dedifferentiation (restarting development)," Keating says. Mice, like humans, are mammals.