Can stem cells grow and replicate indefinitely under laboratory conditions? Or will they specialize into a specific cell line?
I’m a tad bit confused because I read that stem cells can divide under laboratory conditions indefinitetly. But if they specialize into a specific cell line – then isn’t that sentence wrong as the divided stem cells are no longer stem cells.
Another thing – can stem cells (when used wrongly in therapy) cause tumors?
I would say yes as afterall, tumors are specialised cells. What do you think/know?
stem cells can divide undefinetly under laboratory conditions, but it really depends on the things you add to your culture(growth factors etc)
can stem cells cause tumors? i donno of how, but my common sense tells me yes..
Yes. Generally, stem cells will develop into two divisions. After a cleavage, the first one will stay to generate pool for the stem cell itself, whereas the other one will undergo further development/differentiation to become its "fate", which encoding by its actively expressed genetical substances.
Thus, the indefinite growth of stem cells possibly happens to generate the pool of stem cells only. In Plant Cell Culture, it is what we call as "callus" or something like that (don’t have idea the right spell).
