Orofacial Development and Regeneration, Institute of Oral Biology, Centre for Dental Medicine, Medical Faculty, University of Zurich, Plattenstrasse 11, 8032 Zurich, Switzerland.
Wallenberg Center for Molecular Medicine, University of Linkoping, 581 83 Linkoping, Sweden.
Cells. 2022 Oct 28;11(21):3415. doi: 10.3390/cells11213415.
Human teeth are highly innervated organs that contain a variety of mesenchymal stem cell populations that could be used for cell-based regenerative therapies. Specific molecules are often used in these treatments to favorably modulate the function and fate of stem cells. Nogo-A, a key regulator of neuronal growth and differentiation, is already used in clinical tissue regeneration trials. While the functions of Nogo-A in neuronal tissues are extensively explored, its role in teeth still remains unknown. In this work, we first immunohistochemically analyzed the distribution of Nogo-A protein in the dental pulp of human teeth. Nogo-A is localized in a variety of cellular and structural components of the dental pulp, including odontoblasts, fibroblasts, neurons and vessels. We also cross-examined expression in the various pulp cell clusters in a single cell RNA sequencing dataset of human dental pulp, which showed high levels of expression in all cell clusters, including that of stem cells. We then assessed the role of Nogo-A on the fate of human dental pulp stem cells and their differentiation capacity in vitro. Using immunostaining, Alizarin Red S, Nile Red and Oil Red O staining we showed that Nogo-A delayed the differentiation of cultured dental pulp stem cells toward the osteogenic, adipogenic and neurogenic lineages, while addition of the blocking anti-Nogo-A antibody had opposite effects. These results were further confirmed by qRT-PCR, which demonstrated overexpression of genes involved in osteogenic (, , /), adipogenic (, ) and neurogenic (, , ) differentiation in the presence of the anti-Nogo-A antibody. Conversely, the osteogenic and adipogenic genes were downregulated by Nogo-A. Taken together, our results show that the functions of Nogo-A are not restricted to neuronal cells but are extended to other cell populations, including dental pulp stem cells. We show that Nogo-A regulates their fates toward osteogenic, adipogenic and neurogenic differentiation, thus indicating its potential use in clinics.
人类牙齿是高度神经支配的器官,包含多种间充质干细胞群体,可用于基于细胞的再生治疗。在这些治疗中,通常使用特定的分子来有利地调节干细胞的功能和命运。Nogo-A 是神经元生长和分化的关键调节剂,已在临床组织再生试验中使用。虽然 Nogo-A 在神经元组织中的功能得到了广泛的研究,但它在牙齿中的作用仍然未知。在这项工作中,我们首先通过免疫组织化学分析了 Nogo-A 蛋白在人牙髓中的分布。Nogo-A 定位于牙髓的各种细胞和结构成分中,包括成牙本质细胞、成纤维细胞、神经元和血管。我们还在人类牙髓单细胞 RNA 测序数据集的各个牙髓细胞簇中交叉检查了 Nogo-A 的表达情况,结果显示在所有细胞簇中均有高水平表达,包括干细胞。然后,我们评估了 Nogo-A 对人牙髓干细胞命运及其体外分化能力的影响。通过免疫染色、茜素红 S、尼罗红和油红 O 染色,我们表明 Nogo-A 延迟了培养的牙髓干细胞向成骨、成脂和成神经谱系的分化,而添加阻断性抗 Nogo-A 抗体则产生了相反的效果。这些结果通过 qRT-PCR 进一步得到证实,该检测显示在存在抗 Nogo-A 抗体的情况下,参与成骨(、、/)、成脂(、)和神经发生(、、)分化的基因表达上调。相反,Nogo-A 下调了成骨和成脂基因。总之,我们的研究结果表明,Nogo-A 的功能不仅限于神经元细胞,而是扩展到其他细胞群体,包括牙髓干细胞。我们表明 Nogo-A 调节它们向成骨、成脂和成神经分化的命运,因此表明其在临床中的潜在用途。
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