Ganglioneuromas originate from neural crest sympathogonia of the autonomic nervous system. These tumors are benign, fully differentiated tumors that contain mature Schwann cells, ganglion cells, fibrous tissue and nerve fibers. Ganglioneuromas commonly localize in the abdominal and mediastinum regions, such as the adrenal gland, paraspinal retroperitoneum and posterior mediastinum. However, the...

Neural crest cells originating in the occipital region of the avian embryo are known to play a vital role in formation of the septum of the cardiac outflow tract and to contribute cells to the aortic arches, thymus, thyroid and parathyroids. This 'cardiac' neural crest sub-population is assumed to exist in mammals, but without direct evidence. In this paper we demonstrate, using RT-PCR and in s...

We report that two molecular markers correlate with a transient inhibition of neural crest cell entry into the dorsolateral path between the ectoderm and the somite in the avian embryo. During the period when neural crest cells are excluded from the dorsolateral path, both peanut agglutinin lectin (PNA)-binding activity and chondroitin-6-sulfate (C6S) immunoreactivity are expressed within this ...

The vertebrate neural crest is a migratory stem cell population that arises within the central nervous system. Here, we combine embryological techniques with array technology to describe 83 genes that provide the first gene expression profile of a newly induced neural crest cell. This profile contains numerous novel markers of neural crest precursors and reveals previously unrecognized similari...

The neural crest plays a crucial part in cardiac development. Cells of the cardiac subpopulation of cranial neural crest migrate from the hindbrain into the outflow tract of the heart where they contribute to the septum that divides the pulmonary and aortic channels. In Splotch mutant mice, which lack a functional Pax3 gene, migration of cardiac neural crest is deficient and aorticopulmonary se...

The neural crest is a migratory, multipotent cell type that forms a vast array of vertebrate structures including the craniofacial skeleton and peripheral nervous system (Le Douarin and Kalcheim, 1999). Abnormalities in the ability of neural crest cells to reach precise target sites cause myriad birth defects. Unraveling the mechanisms that generate neural crest migratory patterns is essential ...

Endothelin signaling is essential for neural crest development, and dysregulated Endothelin signaling is associated with several neural crest-related disorders, including Waardenburg and other syndromes. However, despite the crucial roles of this pathway in neural crest development and disease, the transcriptional effectors directly activated by Endothelin signaling during neural crest developm...

Neural crest cells arise from the border of the neural plate and epidermal ectoderm,migrate extensively and differentiate into diverse cell types during vertebrate embryogenesis. Althoughmuch has been learnt about growth factor signals and gene regulatory networks that regulate neural crest development, limited information is available on how epigenetic mechanisms control this process. In this ...

We constructed a human pheochromocytoma cDNA library and used differential hybridization to human pheochromocytoma and human neuroblastoma cDNA probes to isolate genes that are highly expressed in the adrenal medullary neuroendocrine tumor, pheochromocytoma, but not in the more immature embryonal tumor of adrenal medulla, neuroblastoma. Two cDNA clones, pG8 and pG2, were more highly expressed i...

Cranial neural crest cells migrate in a precisely segmented manner to form cranial ganglia, facial skeleton and other derivatives. Here, we investigate the mechanisms underlying this patterning in the axolotl embryo using a combination of tissue culture, molecular markers, scanning electron microscopy and vital dye analysis. In vitro experiments reveal an intrinsic component to segmental migrat...