Surprise: Lost stem cells naturally replaced by non-stem cells, fly research suggests
Friday, April 18, 2014 - 12:02
in Biology & Nature
An unexpected phenomenon in the organs that produce sperm in fruit flies has been discovered: When a certain kind of stem cell is killed off experimentally, another group of non-stem cells can come out of retirement to replace them. This study has been using the fruit fly as a model living system in which to study stem cells in their natural state. Most stem cell research is done on cells grown in the laboratory, but in real life, stem cells reside in tissues, where they are sequestered in tiny spaces known as niches. Adult stem cells keep dividing throughout life to make various kinds of cells, like new blood cells and germ cells.