April 25, 2013

Discovery of Wound-Healing Genes in Flies Could Mitigate Human Skin Ailments




Biologists at UC San Diego have identified eight genes never before suspected to play a role in wound healing that are called into action near the areas where wounds occur.

Their discovery, detailed this week in the open-access journal PLOS ONE, was made in the laboratory fruit fly Drosophila. But the biologists say many of the same genes that regulate biological processes in the hard exoskeleton, or cuticle, of Drosophila also control processes in human skin. That makes them attractive candidates for new kinds of wound-healing drugs or other compounds that could be used to treat skin ailments.