Ads
related to: stem cells vs specialized
Search results
Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
Three basic categories of cells make up the mammalian body: germ cells, somatic cells, and stem cells.Each of the approximately 37.2 trillion (3.72x10 13) cells in an adult human has its own copy or copies of the genome except certain cell types, such as red blood cells, that lack nuclei in their fully differentiated state.
By using human embryonic stem cells to produce specialized cells like nerve cells or heart cells in the lab, scientists can gain access to adult human cells without taking tissue from patients. They can then study these specialized adult cells in detail to try to discern complications of diseases, or to study cell reactions to proposed new drugs.
A stem cell line is a group of stem cells that is cultured in vitro and can be propagated indefinitely. Stem cell lines are derived from either animal or human tissues and come from one of three sources: embryonic stem cells, adult stem cells, or induced pluripotent stem cells. They are commonly used in research and regenerative medicine.
A stem cell possesses two properties: . Self-renewal is the ability to go through numerous cycles of cell division while still maintaining its undifferentiated state. Stem cells can replicate several times and can result in the formation of two stem cells, one stem cell more differentiated than the other, or two differentiated cells.
In addition, stem cell are undifferentiated cells which can develop into a specialized cell and are the earliest type of cell in a cell lineage. [2] Due to the differentiation in function, somatic cells are found only in multicellular organisms, as in unicellular ones the purposes of somatic and germ cells are consolidated in one cell.
Cell potency is a cell's ability to differentiate into other cell types. [1] [2] The more cell types a cell can differentiate into, the greater its potency.Potency is also described as the gene activation potential within a cell, which like a continuum, begins with totipotency to designate a cell with the most differentiation potential, pluripotency, multipotency, oligopotency, and finally ...