Topic summary
Somatic cells
Extracted from the Wikipedia article Somatic cell.
Biobanking
Somatic cells have also been collected in the practice of biobanking. The cryoconservation of animal genetic resources is a means of conserving animal genetic material in response to decreasing ecological biodiversity. As populations of organisms fall so does their genetic diversity. This places species long-term survivability at risk. Biobanking aims to preserve biologically viable cells through long-term storage for later use. Somatic cells have been stored with the hopes that they can be reprogrammed into induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), which can then differentiate into viable reproductive cells.