Alive or dead. These two options are no longer sufficient to characterize the state of a cell according to a team of American researchers: " Even if an organism dies, some of its cells retain the ability to reorganize and can form new life structures," summarizes Peter Noble, researcher at the University of Alabama (United States).
In a new study, co-led by Alexander Pozhitkov, biologists observed cells from dead mice and zebrafish. Placed in Petri dishes, these cells spontaneously assembled together, forming small spheres called biobots. This concept is not new: biobots are taking their first steps (literally) in 2020. Researchers at Tufts University (United States) took stem cells from frog embryos that assembled into spheres. Thanks to the cilia on their surface, the The xenobots (named after the frog from which the cells came: Xenopus Laevis), walked around their Petri dish. Better yet, they were even able to self-reproduce.
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