article_snippet.sent: But researchers have found such a pattern in two apparently unrelated places - cells in human skin, and the mysterious fairy circles in Namibia.
article_snippet.sent: While the distribution of desert fairy circles may look random, as if the landscape is marked with freckles, the pattern closely matches the distribution pattern of skin cells.
article_snippet.sent: Researchers have found a similar pattern in two apparently unrelated places - skin cells and the mysterious fairy circles in the Namibian desert.
article_snippet.sent: The illustration on the left shows the distribution of skin cells, and the one on the right plots fairy circles, which are also arranged in polygons .
article_snippet.sent: Now, Professor Sinclair and Haozhe Zhang believe Professor Sinclair and Haozhe Zhang have identified a small, but vital, piece of the puzzle by comparing Professor Sinclair and Haozhe Zhang distribution to skin cells.
article_snippet.sent: The duo compared the number of 'neighbours' adjacent to fairy circles and skin cells, according to the study published in Ecological Complexity.
article_snippet.sent: The majority of skin cells and fairy circles both had six 'neighbours', and similar percentages of other neighbours (shown in this graph) a computer then counted how many neighbours surrounded each fairy circle.
article_snippet.sent: Another group of researchers had calculated skin cell neighbours in a similar way several years ago, which was used as a comparison.
article_snippet.sent: The experts found that the results were almost identical, in that both the majority of skin cells and fairy circles had six neighbours.
article_snippet.sent: And the percentage of fairy circles with four, five, six, seven, eight and nine neighbours was essentially the same as the skin cells.
article_snippet.sent: Another group of researchers suspect the patterns might be similar because both skin cells and fairy circles are fighting for space.
highlights_snippet.sent: Researchers in Japan discovered Researchers in Japan distribution is similar to skin cells .
  
highlights_snippet.sent: Like human cells, the mysterious circles typically have six 'neighbours' 