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. 2022;2450:509–527. doi: 10.1007/978-1-0716-2172-1_27

RNAi Screening to Assess Tissue Regeneration in Planarians.

Rachel H Roberts-Galbraith
PMCID: PMC9761512  PMID: 35359326

Abstract

Over the past several decades, planarians have emerged as a powerful model system with which to study the cellular and molecular basis of whole-body regeneration. The best studied planarians belong to freshwater flatworm species that maintain their remarkable regenerative capacity partly through the deployment of a population of adult pluripotent stem cells. Assessment of gene function in planarian regeneration has primarily been achieved through RNA interference (RNAi), either through the feeding or injection of double-stranded RNA (dsRNA). RNAi treatment of planarians has several advantages, including ease of use, which allows for medium-throughput screens of hundreds of genes over the course of a single project. Here, I present methods for dsRNA synthesis and RNAi feeding, as well as strategies for follow-up assessment of both structural and functional regeneration of organ systems of planarians, with a special emphasis on neural regeneration.

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