Nov 25, 2015 01:20 PM EST By Russell Westerholm, UniversityHerald Reporter

Scientists found a way to manipulate flatworms' cells in order to influence them to grow heads and brains of another species.

According to Live Science, authors of a study published in the International Journal of Molecular Sciences intended the research to demonstrate how physical growth is not exclusively controlled by genetics, as they did not alter the worms' DNA.

"It is commonly thought that the sequence and structure of chromatin - material that makes up chromosomes - determine the shape of an organism, but these results show that the function of physiological networks can override the species-specific default anatomy," study author Michael Levin, chair of the Tufts University Center for Regenerative and Developmental Biology in the School of Arts and Sciences, said in a press release. "By modulating the connectivity of cells via electrical synapses, we were able to derive head morphology and brain patterning belonging to a completely different species from an animal with a normal genome."

For their study, the researchers examined the Girardia dorotocephala, a freshwater flatworm species. After cutting off their test subjects' heads off, the scientists interrupted cell communication during the regeneration process, and watched as the worms grew heads and brains more closely related to other species'.

"We've demonstrated that the electrical connections between cells provide important information for species-specific patterning of the head during regeneration in planarian flatworms," study author Maya Emmons-Bell, a senior biology student at Tufts, said in the release. "This kind of information will be crucial for advances in regenerative medicine, as well as a better understanding of evolutionary biology. As an undergraduate, it's been an extraordinary experience to conduct and author important research with leading biologists."

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