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Our closest worm kin regrow body parts, raising hopes of regeneration in humans

washington.edu

11–20 of 167 posts

Re: Our closest worm kin regrow body parts, raising hopes of regeneration in humans

#11
post #5
post #2

Well, a plausible answer is that if we (or random mutations) re-enable those genes then the end result is simply a lot of cancer. A reasonable default assumption is that each switch in our "genetic configuration" is set to a quite good value. The only exception is if we see a feature that is beneficial at a high calorie cost - those features have been (reasonably) optimized away during our evolution, but would be use…

if you got cancer, just cut that piece off and eat more?

Yeah, just regrow that brain, liver, thyroid gland.

It could be those genes raise chance of cancer everywhere. Not just limbs.

Re: Our closest worm kin regrow body parts, raising hopes of regeneration in humans

#14
This is the type of research where I like to fantasize about the outcome. As a human race we've managed to basically cheat evolution with our advances in medicine and technology. If somehow we can stay alive as a species long enough we very well might be able to discover the secret to regeneration and immortality in some way.

Re: Our closest worm kin regrow body parts, raising hopes of regeneration in humans

#15
post #14

This is the type of research where I like to fantasize about the outcome. As a human race we've managed to basically cheat evolution with our advances in medicine and technology. If somehow we can stay alive as a species long enough we very well might be able to discover the secret to regeneration and immortality in some way.

> If somehow we can stay alive as a species long enough we very well might be able to discover the secret to regeneration and immortality in some way.

Hopefully we won't figure that out before we figure out how to not overcrowd Earth.

Re: Our closest worm kin regrow body parts, raising hopes of regeneration in humans

#16
post #7
post #2

Well, a plausible answer is that if we (or random mutations) re-enable those genes then the end result is simply a lot of cancer. A reasonable default assumption is that each switch in our "genetic configuration" is set to a quite good value. The only exception is if we see a feature that is beneficial at a high calorie cost - those features have been (reasonably) optimized away during our evolution, but would be use…

>Well, a plausible answer is that if we (or random mutations) re-enable those genes then the end result is simply a lot of cancer. Interesting idea, but does the risk of cancer have that much selective pressure? It tends to be the "last thing that kills you", after you live long enough to survive everything else. So it seems like any increased risk of cancer would have to be pretty high before it traded off against i…

It's typically something that only hits you in old age because your body defends against it quite effectively.

Re: Our closest worm kin regrow body parts, raising hopes of regeneration in humans

#18
post #7
post #2

Well, a plausible answer is that if we (or random mutations) re-enable those genes then the end result is simply a lot of cancer. A reasonable default assumption is that each switch in our "genetic configuration" is set to a quite good value. The only exception is if we see a feature that is beneficial at a high calorie cost - those features have been (reasonably) optimized away during our evolution, but would be use…

>Well, a plausible answer is that if we (or random mutations) re-enable those genes then the end result is simply a lot of cancer. Interesting idea, but does the risk of cancer have that much selective pressure? It tends to be the "last thing that kills you", after you live long enough to survive everything else. So it seems like any increased risk of cancer would have to be pretty high before it traded off against i…

For large animals, I'd believe that it's very rare to have non-fatal injuries that are large enough where regeneration would make a big difference to future life.

According to evolution (which hasn't yet noticed medicine), if something rips off your foot, that's not an injury, you simply bleed to death or die of infection even if you win the fight - unlike, say, various small regenerating lizards. What selective pressure could there be to regenerate feet if there were almost no (alive) people with missing feet until the last few hundred years?

However, risk of cancer is serious selective pressure even with short lives - e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devil_facial_tumour_disease. Cancer tends to be the "last thing that kills you" exactly because so much of our biology is tuned to resist cancer. Also, all kinds of mechanisms causing our aging problems seem to be simply evolutionary adaptations to resist cancer by limiting cell division.

Re: Our closest worm kin regrow body parts, raising hopes of regeneration in humans

#19
The interesting studies are all in zebrafish and salamanders, not worms.

One of the more intriguing of the recent ones is this from last year, strongly reinforcing the theory that most species lost proficient regeneration due to evolutionary battles between cancer and aging. The greater question is perhaps why there are any proficient regenerators among the vertebrates rather than why we can't do it.

https://www.ucsf.edu/news/2015/11/251746/human-gene-prevents...

"Whether the regenerative powers of zebrafish and salamanders represent ancient abilities that mammals have lost, perhaps in exchange for advanced tumor-suppression systems remains an open question for biologists. Most tumor suppressor genes, being extremely useful for preventing cancer and for forming tissues during development, are broadly distributed and conserved across many different species. Recent studies, however, suggest that one, the ARF gene, arose more recently in the avian and mammalian lineage, and has no equivalent in the genomes of highly regenerative animals. To explore whether this gene might play a role in preventing tissue regeneration in humans, the researchers added human ARF to the zebrafish genome and assessed how it affected the fishes' normal ability to regrow damaged fins after injury. They found that human ARF had no effect on the fishes' normal development or response to superficial injury, but when the researchers trimmed off the tip of a fish's tail fin, the gene became strongly activated and almost completely prevented fin regrowth by activating a conserved tumor-blocking pathway."

Re: Our closest worm kin regrow body parts, raising hopes of regeneration in humans

#20
post #2

Well, a plausible answer is that if we (or random mutations) re-enable those genes then the end result is simply a lot of cancer. A reasonable default assumption is that each switch in our "genetic configuration" is set to a quite good value. The only exception is if we see a feature that is beneficial at a high calorie cost - those features have been (reasonably) optimized away during our evolution, but would be use…

The ability to regenerate body parts and cancer are not inextricably linked. Take the axolotl. It has the ability to regenerate entire limbs. It's also estimated to be a couple orders of magnitude more resistant to cancer than humans.
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