Scientists identify 'cheater cells' that survive death and regenerate tissue—and may explain cancer relapse

At the Weizmann Institute of Science, researchers have found that certain cells begin the body's programmed death sequence and then pause — surviving, multiplying, and rebuilding damaged tissue in the aftermath of injury. These so-called DARE cells reveal that the boundary between dying and living is not always a threshold crossed, but sometimes a threshold held. In this biological hesitation lies both a gift — the capacity to heal — and a shadow, for cancer may have learned to linger in that same suspended moment, evading the treatments designed to end it.