Adams Gregor B, Scadden David T
Center for Regenerative Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02114, USA.
Nat Immunol. 2006 Apr;7(4):333-7. doi: 10.1038/ni1331.
A signature characteristic of stem cells is their ability to self-renew, affording a theoretically limitless ability to produce daughter cells and their descendents. This near-timeless dimension of stem cell function is not free of the constraints of place. The idea that highly specialized 'microenvironmental' cues participate in the regulation of stem cells has evidence in classic embryology and more recently in adult stem cells through the use of model organisms. There is now ample evidence that an anatomically defined, specifically constituted place represents the niche for hematopoietic and other tissue-specific stem cells. This review provides a conceptual framework and detailed account of the hematopoietic stem cell niche as defined at present. The components are assembling into a more complex view of the niche and may now be amenable to examination as a system and possibly to alteration to affect outcomes in immune regeneration.
干细胞的一个标志性特征是其自我更新的能力，这赋予了它们在理论上产生子细胞及其后代的无限能力。干细胞功能这种近乎永恒的特性并非不受空间限制。高度专业化的“微环境”信号参与干细胞调节这一观点在经典胚胎学中有证据支持，最近在成体干细胞研究中，通过使用模式生物也得到了证实。现在有充分的证据表明，一个在解剖学上有明确界定、特定构成的空间代表了造血干细胞和其他组织特异性干细胞的生态位。本综述提供了一个概念框架，并详细阐述了目前所定义的造血干细胞生态位。这些组成部分正汇聚成一个关于生态位的更复杂的观点，现在或许可以作为一个系统来进行研究，并且有可能通过改变生态位来影响免疫再生的结果。
