scholarly journals Insights into the Biology and Therapeutic Applications of Neural Stem Cells

2016 ◽  
Vol 2016 ◽  
pp. 1-18 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lachlan Harris ◽  
Oressia Zalucki ◽  
Michael Piper ◽  
Julian Ik-Tsen Heng
Keyword(s):  
Stem Cells ◽  
Cerebral Cortex ◽  
Brain Injury ◽  
Neural Stem Cells ◽  
Human Brain ◽  
Therapeutic Potential ◽  
Biological Significance ◽  
Adult Brain ◽  
Cognitive Capacity ◽  
Molecular Characteristics

The cerebral cortex is essential for our higher cognitive functions and emotional reasoning. Arguably, this brain structure is the distinguishing feature of our species, and yet our remarkable cognitive capacity has seemingly come at a cost to the regenerative capacity of the human brain. Indeed, the capacity for regeneration and neurogenesis of the brains of vertebrates has declined over the course of evolution, from fish to rodents to primates. Nevertheless, recent evidence supporting the existence of neural stem cells (NSCs) in the adult human brain raises new questions about the biological significance of adult neurogenesis in relation to ageing and the possibility that such endogenous sources of NSCs might provide therapeutic options for the treatment of brain injury and disease. Here, we highlight recent insights and perspectives on NSCs within both the developing and adult cerebral cortex. Our review of NSCs during development focuses upon the diversity and therapeutic potential of these cells for use in cellular transplantation and in the modeling of neurodevelopmental disorders. Finally, we describe the cellular and molecular characteristics of NSCs within the adult brain and strategies to harness the therapeutic potential of these cell populations in the treatment of brain injury and disease.

scholarly journals Therapeutic Potential of Neurotrophic Factors and Neural Stem Cells Against Ischemic Brain Injury

2000 ◽  
Vol 20 (10) ◽  
pp. 1393-1408 ◽  
Author(s):  
Koji Abe
Keyword(s):  
Stem Cells ◽  
Brain Injury ◽  
Neural Stem Cells ◽  
Neurotrophic Factors ◽  
Therapeutic Potential ◽  
Stem Cell Differentiation ◽  
Adult Brain ◽  
Ischemic Brain Injury ◽  
Ischemic Brain

Development of neuronal and glial cells and their maintenance are under control of neurotrophic factors (NTFs). An exogenous administration of NTFs protects extremely sensitive brain tissue from ischemic damage. On the other hand, it is now known that neural stem cells are present in normal adult brain, and have a potential to compensate and recover neural functions that were lost due to ischemic stroke. These stem cells are also under control of NTFs to differentiate into a certain species of neural cells. Thus, the purpose of this review is to summarize the present understanding of the role of NTFs in normal and ischemic brain and the therapeutic potential of NTF protein itself or gene therapy, and then to summarize the role of NTFs in stem cell differentiation and a possible therapeutic potential with the neural stem cells against ischemic brain injury.

Neural Stem Cells in the Immature, but Not the Mature, Subventricular Zone Respond Robustly to Traumatic Brain Injury

2014 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-42 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew T. Goodus ◽  
Alanna M. Guzman ◽  
Frances Calderon ◽  
Yuhui Jiang ◽  
Steven W. Levison
Keyword(s):  
Traumatic Brain Injury ◽  
Stem Cells ◽  
Flow Cytometry ◽  
Brain Injury ◽  
Neural Stem Cells ◽  
Subventricular Zone ◽  
Proliferative Response ◽  
Fold Increase ◽  
Adult Brain ◽  
Neural Precursors

Pediatric traumatic brain injury is a significant problem that affects many children each year. Progress is being made in developing neuroprotective strategies to combat these injuries. However, investigators are a long way from therapies to fully preserve injured neurons and glia. To restore neurological function, regenerative strategies will be required. Given the importance of stem cells in repairing damaged tissues and the known persistence of neural precursors in the subventricular zone (SVZ), we evaluated regenerative responses of the SVZ to a focal brain lesion. As tissues repair more slowly with aging, injury responses of male Sprague Dawley rats at 6, 11, 17, and 60 days of age and C57Bl/6 mice at 14 days of age were compared. In the injured immature animals, cell proliferation in the dorsolateral SVZ more than doubled by 48 h. By contrast, the proliferative response was almost undetectable in the adult brain. Three approaches were used to assess the relative numbers of bona fide neural stem cells, as follows: the neurosphere assay (on rats injured at postnatal day 11, P11), flow cytometry using a novel 4-marker panel (on mice injured at P14) and staining for stem/progenitor cell markers in the niche (on rats injured at P17). Precursors from the injured immature SVZ formed almost twice as many spheres as precursors from uninjured age-matched brains. Furthermore, spheres formed from the injured brain were larger, indicating that the neural precursors that formed these spheres divided more rapidly. Flow cytometry revealed a 2-fold increase in the percentage of stem cells, a 4-fold increase in multipotential progenitor-3 cells and a 2.5-fold increase in glial-restricted progenitor-2/multipotential-3 cells. Analogously, there was a 2-fold increase in the mitotic index of nestin+/Mash1- immunoreactive cells within the immediately subependymal region. As the early postnatal SVZ is predominantly generating glial cells, an expansion of precursors might not necessarily lead to the production of many new neurons. On the contrary, many BrdU+/doublecortin+ cells were observed streaming out of the SVZ into the neocortex 2 weeks after injuries to P11 rats. However, very few new mature neurons were seen adjacent to the lesion 28 days after injury. Altogether, these data indicate that immature SVZ cells mount a more robust proliferative response to a focal brain injury than adult cells, which includes an expansion of stem cells, primitive progenitors and neuroblasts. Nonetheless, this regenerative response does not result in significant neuronal replacement, indicating that new strategies need to be implemented to retain the regenerated neurons and glia that are being produced.

scholarly journals Adult Neurogenesis and the Promise of Adult Neural Stem Cells

2019 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 117906951985687 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hiyaa S Ghosh
Keyword(s):  
Stem Cells ◽  
Stem Cell ◽  
Neural Stem Cells ◽  
Neural Stem Cell ◽  
Adult Neurogenesis ◽  
Therapeutic Potential ◽  
Precursor Cells ◽  
Adult Brain ◽  
Adult Neural Stem Cell ◽  
Dividing Cells

The adult brain, even though largely postmitotic, is now known to have dividing cells that can make both glia and neurons. Of these, the precursor cells that have the potential to make new neurons in the adult brain have attracted great attention from researchers, anticipating their therapeutic potential for neurodegenerative conditions. In this review, I will focus on adult neurogenesis, from the perspective of the overall neurogenic potential in the adult brain, current understanding of the ‘adult neural stem cell’, and the importance of niche as a decisive factor for neurogenesis under homeostasis and pathologic conditions.

Isolation of neural stem cells from damaged rat cerebral cortex after traumatic brain injury

Neuroreport ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 16 (15) ◽  
pp. 1687-1691 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tatsuki Itoh ◽  
Takao Satou ◽  
Shigeo Hashimoto ◽  
Hiroyuki Ito
Keyword(s):  
Traumatic Brain Injury ◽  
Stem Cells ◽  
Cerebral Cortex ◽  
Brain Injury ◽  
Neural Stem Cells ◽  
Rat Cerebral Cortex

scholarly journals Modeling of Hypoxic Brain Injury through 3D Human Neural Organoids

Cells ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 234
Author(s):  
Min Soo Kim ◽  
Da-Hyun Kim ◽  
Hyun Kyoung Kang ◽  
Myung Geun Kook ◽  
Soon Won Choi ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Stem Cells ◽  
Cerebral Cortex ◽  
Brain Injury ◽  
Neural Stem Cells ◽  
Neurodegenerative Diseases ◽  
Drug Screening ◽  
Human Cerebral Cortex ◽  
Hypoxic Injury ◽  
Hypoxic Brain Injury ◽  
Hypoxic Brain

Brain organoids have emerged as a novel model system for neural development, neurodegenerative diseases, and human-based drug screening. However, the heterogeneous nature and immature neuronal development of brain organoids generated from pluripotent stem cells pose challenges. Moreover, there are no previous reports of a three-dimensional (3D) hypoxic brain injury model generated from neural stem cells. Here, we generated self-organized 3D human neural organoids from adult dermal fibroblast-derived neural stem cells. Radial glial cells in these human neural organoids exhibited characteristics of the human cerebral cortex trend, including an inner (ventricular zone) and an outer layer (early and late cortical plate zones). These data suggest that neural organoids reflect the distinctive radial organization of the human cerebral cortex and allow for the study of neuronal proliferation and maturation. To utilize this 3D model, we subjected our neural organoids to hypoxic injury. We investigated neuronal damage and regeneration after hypoxic injury and reoxygenation. Interestingly, after hypoxic injury, reoxygenation restored neuronal cell proliferation but not neuronal maturation. This study suggests that human neural organoids generated from neural stem cells provide new opportunities for the development of drug screening platforms and personalized modeling of neurodegenerative diseases, including hypoxic brain injury.

scholarly journals mRNA-Driven Generation of Transgene-Free Neural Stem Cells from Human Urine-Derived Cells

Cells ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (9) ◽  
pp. 1043 ◽  
Author(s):  
Phil Jun Kang ◽  
Daryeon Son ◽  
Tae Hee Ko ◽  
Wonjun Hong ◽  
Wonjin Yun ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Stem Cells ◽  
Neural Stem Cells ◽  
Human Urine ◽  
Neurological Disorders ◽  
Therapeutic Potential ◽  
Embryonic Stem ◽  
Global Gene Expression ◽  
Patient Specific ◽  
Human Neural Stem Cells

Human neural stem cells (NSCs) hold enormous promise for neurological disorders, typically requiring their expandable and differentiable properties for regeneration of damaged neural tissues. Despite the therapeutic potential of induced NSCs (iNSCs), a major challenge for clinical feasibility is the presence of integrated transgenes in the host genome, contributing to the risk for undesired genotoxicity and tumorigenesis. Here, we describe the advanced transgene-free generation of iNSCs from human urine-derived cells (HUCs) by combining a cocktail of defined small molecules with self-replicable mRNA delivery. The established iNSCs were completely transgene-free in their cytosol and genome and further resembled human embryonic stem cell-derived NSCs in the morphology, biological characteristics, global gene expression, and potential to differentiate into functional neurons, astrocytes, and oligodendrocytes. Moreover, iNSC colonies were observed within eight days under optimized conditions, and no teratomas formed in vivo, implying the absence of pluripotent cells. This study proposes an approach to generate transplantable iNSCs that can be broadly applied for neurological disorders in a safe, efficient, and patient-specific manner.

scholarly journals Neural stem cells: involvement in adult neurogenesis and CNS repair

2008 ◽  
Vol 363 (1500) ◽  
pp. 2111-2122 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hideyuki Okano ◽  
Kazunobu Sawamoto
Keyword(s):  
Stem Cells ◽  
Neural Stem Cells ◽  
Cell Transplantation ◽  
Adult Neurogenesis ◽  
Embryonic Stem ◽  
Adult Brain ◽  
Therapeutic Interventions ◽  
Cell Transplantation Therapy ◽  
Transplantation Therapy

Recent advances in stem cell research, including the selective expansion of neural stem cells (NSCs) in vitro , the induction of particular neural cells from embryonic stem cells in vitro , the identification of NSCs or NSC-like cells in the adult brain and the detection of neurogenesis in the adult brain (adult neurogenesis), have laid the groundwork for the development of novel therapies aimed at inducing regeneration in the damaged central nervous system (CNS). There are two major strategies for inducing regeneration in the damaged CNS: (i) activation of the endogenous regenerative capacity and (ii) cell transplantation therapy. In this review, we summarize the recent findings from our group and others on NSCs, with respect to their role in insult-induced neurogenesis (activation of adult NSCs, proliferation of transit-amplifying cells, migration of neuroblasts and survival and maturation of the newborn neurons), and implications for therapeutic interventions, together with tactics for using cell transplantation therapy to treat the damaged CNS.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document