Horiguchi Satoshi, Takahashi Jun, Kishi Yo, Morizane Asuka, Okamoto Yo, Koyanagi Masaomi, Tsuji Masayuki, Tashiro Kei, Honjo Tasuku, Fujii Shingo, Hashimoto Nobuo
Department of Neurosurgery, Kyoto University Graduate School of Medicine, Kyoto, Japan.
J Neurosci Res. 2004 Mar 15;75(6):817-24. doi: 10.1002/jnr.20046.
Recent studies have revealed that neural precursor cells can be expanded not only from the subventricular zone and hippocampus but also from other regions of the human embryonic brain. To determine the regional differences of these precursor cells, we divided the brain of a 9-week-old human embryo into four parts, i.e., telencephalon, diencephalon, mesencephalon, and rhombencephalon. All cultures of the tissues yielded neurospheres, and these spheres gave rise to neurons, astrocytes, and oligodendrocytes. An analysis of clonal populations revealed that these precursor cells were multipotent, and two region-specific differences in neural precursor cells were revealed: 1) The precursor cells from the rostral part of the brain tended to proliferate faster than those from the caudal part, and 2) the precursor cells from the diencephalon and mesencephalon gave rise to more tyrosine hydoxylase (TH)-positive neurons than those from the telencephalon and rhombencephalon. When 50-day-cultured spheres were caused to differentiate, the percentage of TH-positive cells per total cell population was 1.2% for diencephalic and mesencephalic precursors, whereas it was 0.4% for telencephalic and rhombencephalic ones. Furthermore, the TH-positive cells from diencephalic and mesencephalic precursors were large, multipolar, and gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA)-negative, which suggested that these cells were midbrain dopaminergic neurons. In contrast, TH-positive cells from telencephalic and rhombencephalic precursors were small, bipolar, and GABA-positive. These results suggest that human neural precursor cells might have the potential to differentiate into a variety of cells but retain regional specificity.
最近的研究表明，神经前体细胞不仅可以从脑室下区和海马体中扩增出来，还可以从人类胚胎大脑的其他区域中扩增出来。为了确定这些前体细胞的区域差异，我们将一个9周大的人类胚胎的大脑分为四个部分，即端脑、间脑、中脑和后脑。所有组织培养物都产生了神经球，并且这些球体产生了神经元、星形胶质细胞和少突胶质细胞。对克隆群体的分析表明，这些前体细胞具有多能性，并且揭示了神经前体细胞的两个区域特异性差异：1）来自大脑前部的前体细胞比来自后部的前体细胞增殖得更快，2）来自间脑和中脑的前体细胞比来自端脑和后脑的前体细胞产生更多的酪氨酸羟化酶（TH）阳性神经元。当使培养50天的球体分化时，间脑和中脑前体细胞的TH阳性细胞占总细胞群体的百分比为1.2%，而端脑和后脑前体细胞的这一比例为0.4%。此外，来自间脑和中脑前体细胞的TH阳性细胞体积大、多极且γ-氨基丁酸（GABA）阴性，这表明这些细胞是中脑多巴胺能神经元。相比之下，来自端脑和后脑前体细胞的TH阳性细胞体积小、双极且GABA阳性。这些结果表明，人类神经前体细胞可能具有分化为多种细胞的潜力，但保留区域特异性。
