Increasing evidence indicates that development of embryonic central nervous system precursors is tightly regulated by extrinsic cues located in the local environment. Here, we asked whether neurotrophin-mediated signaling through Trk tyrosine kinase receptors is important for embryonic cortical precursor cell development. These studies demonstrate that inhibition of TrkB (Ntrk2) and/or TrkC (Nt...

Stem cell-based regenerative therapies hold great potential for the treatment of degenerative disorders such as Parkinson’s disease (PD). We recently reported the repair and functional recovery after treatment with human marrow-isolated adult multilineage inducible (MIAMI) cells adhered to neurotrophin-3 (NT3) releasing pharmacologically active microcarriers (PAMs) in hemiparkinsonian rats. In ...

Programmed death and the identification of growth factors delaying this process in the oligodendrocyte lineage suggest that other cell types provide oligodendrogliotrophins. To determine their source, primary cultures of oligodendroblasts immunopurified from postnatal rat cerebrum were used to screen other cultured neural and non-neural cell types for the release of survival factors into a defi...

Neurotrophins cooperate with neural activity to modulate CNS neuronal survival and dendritic differentiation. In a previous study, we demonstrated that a critical balance of neurotrophin and neural activity is required for Purkinje cell survival in cocultures of purified granule and Purkinje cells (Morrison and Mason, 1998). Here we investigate whether TrkB signaling regulates dendrite and spin...

The aim of this study was to assess the feasibility of transplanting mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), genetically modified to express glial-derived neurotrophic factor (GDNF), to the contused rat spinal cord, and to subsequently assess their neural differentiation potential. MSCs expressing green fluorescent protein were transduced with a retroviral vector to express the neurotrophin GDNF. The tr...

Neuronal regeneration and axonal re-growth in the injured mammalian central nervous system remains an unsolved field. To date, three myelin-associated proteins [Nogo or reticulon 4 (RTN4), myelin-associated glycoprotein (MAG) and oligodendrocyte myelin glycoprotein (OMG)] are known to inhibit axonal regeneration via activation of the neuronal glycosylphosphatidylinositol-anchored Nogo receptor ...

The response of brain tissue to neurotrophins during rat development was examined using a novel in vitro assay for Trk/neurotrophin receptor activity. In this assay, brain tissues were exposed to neutrophins and ligand-induced Trk tyrosine phosphorylation was measured. During the perinatal period, Trk tyrosine phsphorylation in all brain area was induced very similarly by the TrkB and TrkC liga...