MiR-124 promotes bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells differentiation into neurogenic cells for accelerating recovery in the spinal cord injury.

In this research, mouse BMMSCs were isolated from bone marrow, induced to differentiate into neurogenic cells in vitro, and transplanted into the injured spinal cord after over-expression of miR-124. The results showed that the BMMSCs could induce the differentiation to neurogenic cells under the special condition medium, but when the miR-124 was over-expressed, the differentiation efficiency of neurogenic cells from BMMSCs could be promoted. This reason was demonstrated that polypyrimidine tract-binding protein 1 (PTBP1) showed a repressor for polypyrimidine tract-binding protein 2 (PTBP2) during neuronal differentiation, miR-124 reduces PTBP1 levels, leading to the accumulation of correctly spliced PTBP2 mRNA and a dramatic increase in PTBP2 protein. miR-124 promoted neurogenic cells from BMMSCs were successful colonized into injured spinal cord for participation in tissue-repair. In conclusion, our research shows that the miR-124 promoted the differentiation of neuronal cells from BMMSCs, and this mechanism was miR-124 reduced the expression of PTBP1, increased the expression of PTBP2.