Question: how do you get the zebrafish to show you how they regenarate their bodys

Juan Carlos Lopez-Baez answered on 8 Mar 2014:

Hi ccraig

Unfortunately, the fish cannot communicate with us, so it cannot tell us when and how it regenerates its body. The way to tell is simply by observing it over time. For example, with their fins, we can measure the growth of the amputated fins over time and see how much they grow every day.

In other organs and tissues, however, this is not as straight forward. We have to know how the tissue should look like in order to be able to know if it has regenerated. In many cases we use other zebrafish of the same age to compare the regenerated tissue from one fish with the normal tissue of another.

Lastly, we have also created ways in which we can look at the genes being expressed (the genes are the instructions that determine how the cells in your body will behave and look like). If the cells in the new regenerated tissue express the same genes as the cells in the original tissues, then we can certify that it has regenerated!