This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).
Animals vary tremendously in their ability to replace lost body parts. While some animals, such as humans, cannot re-grow most body parts, others, such as some segmented worms, can re-grow an entire body from a small fragment of the original animal. The ultimate goal of this research is to understand the root causes of this variation and to identify factors that can cause regeneration, the process of body part replacement, to fail or proceed. Specifically, this work focuses on two closely related species of segmented worms, one that can regenerate its head and the other that cannot do so except when the cut occurs within developmentally very young tissue. Investigations in these two species will identify genes and developmental processes that may allow an animal to regenerate even when it usually cannot do so. Determining the specific conditions under which regeneration can be elicited in an otherwise non-regenerating species will further understanding of the natural blocks to successful regeneration and suggest paths to circumventing these blocks. This work will foster the training of a diverse group of undergraduate, graduate, and post-graduate researchers within an environment highly supportive of strong mentoring. This laboratory has provided and will continue to provide opportunities to diverse students including underrepresented groups such as minorities. Lab personnel will actively participate in disseminating research results, and research findings will be disseminated broadly and in a timely manner. Genetic resources will be made available to the research community through a freely available sequence repository shortly after acquisition.
