Cellular regulation of regeneration in spiny mice

Exactly how some animals regenerate lost appendages has remained a biological enigma for hundreds of years.  The discovery some mammals can regenerate skin and musculoskeletal tissue has created an opportunity to identify key factors that stimulate a regenerative response to injury, rather than a fibrotic scarring one.

Rabbits and African spiny mice, for instance, regenerate excised tissue to fill large musculoskeletal defects through their ear pinna, while other mammals heal identical defects through fibrotic repair. 

On Friday, April 20, Dr. Ashley Seifert will discuss how comparative analysis of regenerating spiny mice with non-regenerating rodents suggests macrophages and cell cycle proteins are key regulators of tissue regeneration in adult mammals. He will talk about his lab’s studies showing specific macrophages can regulate fibrotic behaviour of connective tissue that produces collagen and other fibers. And Dr. Seifert will share new research that shows fibroblasts in regenerating species have better proliferative capacity.  Ultimately, regeneration studies using spiny mice could help provide a blueprint for the manipulation of the injury microenvironment to improve regenerative abilities in humans.

Dr. Ashley Seifert is an assistant professor in the Department of Biology at the University of Kentucky.  After earning an MSc in Zoology at the University of Florida, he completed his PhD studying genitourinary development in mice, making important contributions to our understanding of cell lineage and the molecular control of genital development. Building on a decades-old interest in appendage regeneration he went on to work with Professor Malcolm Maden and developed the salamander as a model to understand skin regeneration. During this time,  he developed a field project to investigate skin shedding in wild African spiny mice, which led to the discovery that African spiny mice could regenerate skin and musculoskeletal tissue.

Building on his work with salamanders and spiny mice, Dr. Seifert established his own research group in 2013 at the University of Kentucky. He has been a visiting professor in the Department of Veterinary Anatomy and Physiology at the University of Nairobi (Kenya) since 2009. His current research explores the cellular and molecular mechanisms controlling regeneration across vertebrates. Recent work from his group has focused on how cells in the injury microenvironment are affected by the immune response during regeneration.