First complete genome assembly of planarian flatworm reveals treasure trove on function and evolution of genes

The planarian flatworm Schmidtea mediterranea is an extraordinary animal. Even when cut into tiny pieces, each piece can regenerate back into a complete and perfectly proportioned miniature planarian. Key to this ability are fascinating adult stem cells, a single one of which can restore a complete worm. But how Schmidtea mediterranea achieves these feats is so far poorly understood. An important step towards this goal is the first highly contiguous genome assembly of Schmidtea mediterranea. The...