Cell Division Reversed for the First Time
Gary J. Gorbsky, Ph.D., a scientist with the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation, [a href="vny!://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-04/omrf-rpn041006.php"]has found a way [/a]to reverse the process of cell division. The [a href="vny!://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v440/n7086/pdf/nature04652.pdf"]discovery[/a] could have important implications for the treatment of cancer, birth defects and numerous other diseases and disorders.
Gorbsky's findings appear in the April 13 issue of the journal Nature. "No one has gotten the cell cycle to go backwards before now," said Gorbsky. "This shows that certain events in the cell cycle that have long been assumed irreversible may, in fact, be reversible."
In the lab, Gorbsky and his OMRF colleagues were able to control the protein responsible for the division process, interrupt and reverse the event, sending duplicate chromosomes back to the center of the original cell, an event once thought impossible. Here is a [a href="vny!://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v440/n7086/extref/nature04652-s6.mov"]video[/a] of it happening.
