Multicellular organisms can be regenerated from totipotent differentiated somatic cell or
nuclear founders [1–3]. Organisms regenerated from clonally related isogenic founders
might a priori have been expected to be phenotypically invariant. However, clonal
regenerant animals display variant phenotypes caused by defective epigenetic
reprogramming of gene expression [2], and clonal regenerant plants exhibit poorly
understood heritable phenotypic (" somaclonal") variation [4–7]. Here we show that …

Multicellular organisms can be regenerated from totipotent differentiated somatic cell or
nuclear founders. Organisms regenerated from clonally related isogenic founders might a
priori have been expected to be phenotypically invariant. However, clonal regenerant
animals display variant phenotypes caused by defective epigenetic reprogramming of gene
expression, and clonal regenerant plants exhibit poorly understood heritable phenotypic ("
somaclonal") variation. Here we show that somaclonal variation in regenerant Arabidopsis …