A study by scientists at The Forsyth Institute has suggested strategies for triggering the body to make new cartilage cells, which could have major implications in regenerative medicine for repairing cartilage injuries and degeneration. In their paper in Science Advances, co-first author Takamitsu Maruyama, PhD, and Daigaku Hasegawa, PhD, together with and senior author Wei Hsu, PhD, and colleagues, described two breakthrough discoveries, including a new understanding of a multifaced protein called β-catenin. Maruyama stated, “The goal of this study was to figure out how to regenerate cartilage. We wanted to determine how to control cell fate, to cause the somatic cell to become cartilage instead of bone.” Their report is titled “GATA3 mediates nonclassical β-catenin signaling in skeletal cell fate determination and ectopic chondrogenesis.”
