Salamanders don’t regrow limbs from scratch

Tissues in axolotl amputees regenerate themselves by “memory”

Given a chance to regrow a limb, salamanders don’t change a thing.

Since the 18th century, scientists have puzzled over how salamanders regenerate amputated limbs and have looked for clues to regrow human limbs. Researchers thought they knew part of the answer: Cells at the wound site would lose their identities as they turned back their developmental clocks to become pluripotent stem cells — capable of developing into many cell types in the body — and then recreate the lost limb.