{"id":3037,"date":"2020-01-22T03:26:35","date_gmt":"2020-01-22T11:26:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/keck.usc.edu\/news\/looking-to-lizards-in-hopes-of-healing-humans\/"},"modified":"2023-11-26T08:29:44","modified_gmt":"2023-11-26T16:29:44","slug":"looking-to-lizards-in-hopes-of-healing-humans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/keck.usc.edu\/news\/looking-to-lizards-in-hopes-of-healing-humans\/","title":{"rendered":"Looking to lizards in hopes of healing humans"},"content":{"rendered":"\n \n \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
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\n\n \n Press Release<\/span>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n \n \n
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Looking to lizards in hopes of healing humans<\/h1>\n\n\n<\/div>\n \n \n
\n \n January 22, 2020<\/span>\n <\/div>\n \n \n
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Thomas Lozito and Donald the crested gecko (Photo\/Sergio Bianco)<\/figcaption>\n <\/figure>\n \n \n \n\n<\/div>\n \n\n <\/div><\/div>\n\r\n\r\n\n\n \n \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
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Some students sell blood plasma to make extra cash during graduate school.\u00a0Thomas Lozito<\/a>, PhD, a new assistant professor of orthopaedic surgery and stem cell biology and regenerative medicine at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, sold poison dart frogs to ward off the impecunity of the PhD years.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I was in high school and all the way up to graduate school, my goal was to keep every different species of dart frog,\u201d he said.\u00a0 \u201cThey\u2019re beautiful. I would set up a colony, take care of them, and actually breed them. I was able to supplement my income in graduate school with breeding these rare frogs.\u201d<\/p>\n

To this day, amphibians and reptiles remain central to Lozito\u2019s career. His USC laboratory compares limb and tail regeneration in lizards and salamanders with the goal of applying this knowledge to improve healing in humans.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I got my first grant for studying lizard tail regeneration, my mom was surprised that all the time \u2018wasted\u2019 obsessing over these reptiles and amphibians\u2014I was actually able to incorporate it into a career,\u201d said Lozito, whose pets have included chameleons, lizards, turtles, fish, octopi, squid and a python.<\/p>\n

From animals to bioengineering<\/strong><\/p>\n

Growing up, Lozito initially dreamed of becoming a paleontologist, then a veterinarian. By the time he was an undergraduate at Johns Hopkins University, he had shifted his focus to biomedical engineering, with minors in both chemical engineering and math. He began focusing on stem cell biology during his PhD, which he pursued through a joint program between the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Cambridge University.<\/p>\n

When his graduate school mentor Rocky Tuan, PhD, moved from NIH to the University of Pittsburgh, Lozito joined him as a postdoctoral trainee. Tuan gave Lozito the freedom to pursue his interest in lizard tail regeneration, which resulted in several research publications and an NIH R01 grant. Based on these successes, Lozito earned a position as an assistant professor, first at the University of Pittsburgh, and then at USC.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of the day, there are so many amazing animal abilities,\u201d Lozito said. \u201cI found myself drawn to finding out exactly how animals do the things that they do. Just in terms of the medical field, there are animals that are resistant to cancer, that can regenerate limbs. I\u2019m almost thinking of them as superpowers.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Superpower\u2019 salamanders<\/strong><\/p>\n

Lozito studies a salamander species, the axolotl, that possesses the \u201csuperpower\u201d of regrowing a perfect tail or limb following amputation. His lab compares the axolotl with three lizard species \u2014 the mourning gecko, sarasinorum gecko and green anole \u2014 that regrow imperfect tails made of cartilage in lieu of bony vertebrae. His lab also studies the crested gecko, which doesn\u2019t regrow its tail at all.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe axolotl salamander spends its life in a larval stage, so that \u2018Peter Pan syndrome\u2019 of never growing up is not directly applicable to mammals,\u201d he said. \u201cLizards are the closest relatives to mammals that are able to regenerate an appendage in their tail. Their immune systems are similar to those of mammals. Their genomic structure is similar to mammals. Their developmental processes are similar to mammals. So what we find with lizards is more directly applicable to improving mammalian wound healing.\u201d<\/p>\n

In addition, Lozito\u2019s research could inform efforts to stimulate cartilage regeneration as a treatment for arthritis, or even advance spinal cord regeneration.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are some amazing lizard species out there,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd how to translate animals\u2019 superpowers to humans is something I\u2019m really interested in.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2014 Cristy Lytal<\/p>\n