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Nature Cell Biology 10, 503–505 (1 May 2008) | doi:10.1038/ncb0508-503

Inflammation as a matchmaker: revisiting cell fusion

Ilyas Singec & Evan Y. Snyder

The term 'cell fusion' acquired a pejorative connotation in the field of cell transplantation when it was discovered to underly the misinterpretation that cells of one lineage could transdifferentiate into cells of developmentally unrelated lineages. However, the process itself actually has an important biological role in the development, physiology and disease of multicellular organisms.