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Phoenix666 [soylentnews.org] writes:

To develop new treatments for skin cancer, drugs need to be tested on animals. Now scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Biology of Ageing in Cologne have been able to grow mouse skin stem cells in a dish. These stem cells in a test-tube could reduce the number of animal experiments [phys.org].

Wounds need to heal and dead hairs need to be replaced. Responsible for this are the so-called hair follicle stem cells in our skin. These stem cells can mature into all the different cell types in the skin epidermis. If they are out of control skin cancer can develop.

"We wanted to develop a system to study hair follicle stem cells in the skin and their role in cancer development", explains Carlos Andrés Chacón-Martínez, a scientist in the group of Sara Wickström at the Max Planck Institute for Biology of Ageing in Cologne. "Usually we need to use model organisms, such as mice. But it requires a large number of animals and years to study. With our new method we can readily investigate these stem cells in a petri dish in short periods. As a result we don't need that many animals anymore."

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