Stanford study finds front and back of brain develop separately
Turns out, your brain could be more of a duo than a solo act.
A new Stanford study found that the front of the brain actually comes from a different progenitor cell than the back of the brain during early development, basically making them like two separate organs.
This helps explain why scientists struggled to grow certain brain cells in the lab before; they were using stem cells programmed for one part of the brain, not both.
Ancient split informs stem cell guidance
The team saw similar patterns in animals like zebrafish, hinting this split goes way back, about 500 million years ago.
Now, with a better map of how brains form, researchers can guide stem cells to become specific neuron types.
That could mean big progress for studying diseases like amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and developing new treatments down the line.