“Self-eating” Process of Stem Cells May be Key to New Regenerative Therapies – Mirage News

Translucently colored embryonic stem (ES) cell (upper right) and its differentiating derivatives (left and lower right). The small round bodies inside cells represent lysosomes, with the pink color indicating ones that are undergoing chaperone-mediated autophagy (CMA), a selective form of autophagy that is demonstrated only in mammals. CMA governs the balance between self-renewal and differentiation of ES cells. It is kept at low levels in undifferentiated ES cells to maintain the pluripotent st…

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