Amputated fingertips sometimes grow back (2013)
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Re: Amputated fingertips sometimes grow back (2013)
#2This is one of my favorite weird biological facts. It actually happened to a friend of mine. It shows that the programming for regeneration is in there, we just need to activate it.
Re: Amputated fingertips sometimes grow back (2013)
#3Did anybody pick up on how the fingerprint doesn't come back? I wonder why that is.
Re: Amputated fingertips sometimes grow back (2013)
#4Did anybody pick up on how the fingerprint doesn't come back? I wonder why that is.
I have heard that fingerprints are not genetic, but instead form in utero from the random motions of amniotic fluid.
Re: Amputated fingertips sometimes grow back (2013)
#5I chopped off around 3-4mm off the tip of my left index finger as a kid with a lawn trimmer. 20 years later, I punched a nice groove around 3mm deep into the tip of another finger tip while trying to get tea out of a tea tube [0] (don't buy these things).
It took weeks, but both times, the tips grew back perfectly round and smooth, even the fingerprints are back. The regrown tips felt a bit numb for 1-2 months, but then everything was back to normal. The second time I asked a friend, who is a medical doctor, how the body "knew" the form of the fingertip and the fingerprints. Where was this information stored? His answer was basically: we have no idea, just be grateful it works.
[0] https://www.hochland-kaffee.de/media/catalog/product/cache/1...
Re: Amputated fingertips sometimes grow back (2013)
#6I chopped off around 3-4mm off the tip of my left index finger as a kid with a lawn trimmer. 20 years later, I punched a nice groove around 3mm deep into the tip of another finger tip while trying to get tea out of a tea tube [0] (don't buy these things). It took weeks, but both times, the tips grew back perfectly round and smooth, even the fingerprints are back. The regrown tips felt a bit numb for 1-2 months, but t…
My finger tip got pinched under a lid and a small chunk was torn off but somehow it all healed with matching fingerprints that blends in.
Re: Amputated fingertips sometimes grow back (2013)
#7Bone fracture healing is also, exactly, regeneration. Regeneration of fingertips in small children is almost universal, provided you don't stitch it up.
George Becker's book "The Body Electric" is the most complete exploration of regeneration I have encountered to date. Becker's suspicion was that we gave up general regeneration in exchange for cancer resistance.
Updates welcome! TBE deserves follow-up.
Re: Amputated fingertips sometimes grow back (2013)
#8Almost exactly a year ago I cut a 45 degree chunk off my thumb (box cutter working with drywall...). Straight cut, thumb looked like "Gumby".
A year later you'd never be able to tell, rounded again with fingerprints as well. Quite amazing given I'm middle aged.
Re: Amputated fingertips sometimes grow back (2013)
#9I chopped off around 3-4mm off the tip of my left index finger as a kid with a lawn trimmer. 20 years later, I punched a nice groove around 3mm deep into the tip of another finger tip while trying to get tea out of a tea tube [0] (don't buy these things). It took weeks, but both times, the tips grew back perfectly round and smooth, even the fingerprints are back. The regrown tips felt a bit numb for 1-2 months, but t…
I caught my finges in the chain of a swing as a child and tore about half the pad of my pinkies away to a similar depth, one narrow strip was still attached so I held it on with bandaids after washing it. It grew back together but now there is an offset or fault line in my print.
Re: Amputated fingertips sometimes grow back (2013)
#10Did anybody pick up on how the fingerprint doesn't come back? I wonder why that is.
I sliced off a fingertip once and it grew back, fingerprint and all. It's a fingerprint, though, I'm not sure it's the fingerprint.