University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY, USA.
Stowers Institute for Medical Research, Kansas City, MO, USA; Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Kansas City, MO, USA.
Dev Biol. 2022 Sep;489:165-177. doi: 10.1016/j.ydbio.2022.06.003. Epub 2022 Jun 13.
Planarian flatworms are best known for their impressive regenerative capacity, yet this trait varies across species. In addition, planarians have other features that share morphology and function with the tissues of many other animals, including an outer mucociliary epithelium that drives planarian locomotion and is very similar to the epithelial linings of the human lung and oviduct. Planarians occupy a broad range of ecological habitats and are known to be sensitive to changes in their environment. Yet, despite their potential to provide valuable insight to many different fields, very few planarian species have been developed as laboratory models for mechanism-based research. Here we describe a previously undocumented planarian isolate, Girardia sp. (Guanajuato). After collecting this isolate from a freshwater habitat in central Mexico, we characterized it at the morphological, cellular, and molecular level. We show that Girardia sp. (Guanajuato) not only shares features with animals in the Girardia genus but also possesses traits that appear unique to this isolate. By thoroughly characterizing this new planarian isolate, our work facilitates future comparisons to other flatworms and further molecular dissection of the unique and physiologically-relevant traits observed in this Girardia sp. (Guanajuato) isolate.
涡虫是最著名的再生能力强的扁形动物，但这种特性在不同物种之间存在差异。此外，涡虫还有其他与许多其他动物的组织具有相似形态和功能的特征，包括一个外黏膜纤毛上皮，它驱动涡虫的运动，非常类似于人类肺和输卵管的上皮衬里。涡虫占据了广泛的生态栖息地，并且已知对环境变化敏感。然而，尽管它们有可能为许多不同领域提供有价值的见解，但很少有扁形动物物种被开发为基于机制的研究的实验室模型。在这里，我们描述了一个以前未被记录的涡虫分离株，Girardia sp.（瓜纳华托）。从墨西哥中部的淡水栖息地收集到这个分离株后，我们在形态、细胞和分子水平上对其进行了表征。我们表明，Girardia sp.（瓜纳华托）不仅与Girardia 属的动物具有相似的特征，而且还具有似乎是该分离株特有的特征。通过对这个新的涡虫分离株进行全面的特征描述，我们的工作促进了未来与其他扁形动物的比较，并进一步对在这个Girardia sp.（瓜纳华托）分离株中观察到的独特的和生理相关的特征进行分子剖析。
