Turritopsis dohrnii Resets Its Life Cycle in 24-48 Hours Through Cellular Transdifferentiation
Updated
Updated · The Guardian · Aug 4
Turritopsis dohrnii Resets Its Life Cycle in 24-48 Hours Through Cellular Transdifferentiation
3 articles · Updated · The Guardian · Aug 4
Summary
Turritopsis dohrnii can revert from an adult jellyfish to a juvenile polyp within 24 to 48 hours, effectively restarting its life cycle instead of dying.
Stress triggers that reset — including high temperatures, starvation, physical cutting and chemicals in the water — prompt the species to undergo cellular transdifferentiation, keeping the same genome.
Maria Pia Miglietta said the few-millimetre jellyfish can theoretically live forever in lab conditions, though predators can still kill it in the wild.
Only 1 of 8 accepted Turritopsis species is known to have this trait, and it has been found from the Mediterranean and Atlantic to Japan, Panama and Brazil.
Hidden in ship ballast water, could these immortal, self-cloning jellyfish silently conquer the world's oceans while escaping the natural rule of death?
If an organism completely resets its cells to survive fatal stress, is it truly the same creature or a clone born from destruction?
Could the genetic secrets of this tiny jellyfish hold the key to reversing human aging, or is eternal life purely biological fiction?