Delivery of neurotrophic factors to the injured spinal cord has been shown to stimulate neuronal survival and regeneration. This indicates that a lack of sufficient trophic support is one factor contributing to the absence of spontaneous regeneration in the mammalian spinal cord. Regulation of the expression of neurotrophic factors and receptors after spinal cord injury has not been studied in ...

Spinal motoneurons innervating skeletal muscle were amongst the first neurons shown to require the presence of their target cells to develop appropriately. Isolated embryonic chick and rat motoneurons have been used to identify neurotrophic factors and cytokines capable of supporting the survival of developing motoneurons. Such factors include ciliary neurotrophic factor (CNTF), which is presen...

Evidences related to the fact that there is a immunological functional disorder in autism are gradually increasing. Since immunological mechanisms play a role in the neuronal cell migration, axonal development and formation of synapses, it is mentioned that there is an immune mediated inflammatory period exists (Bradstreet et al. 2007). Central nervous system and immune system are systems which...

Activity-dependent competition between afferents in the primary visual cortex of many mammals is a quintessential feature of neuronal development. From both experimental and theoretical perspectives, understanding the mechanisms underlying competition is a significant challenge. Recent experimental work suggests that geniculocortical afferents might compete for retrograde neurotrophic factors. ...

The dentate gyrus of adult mammalian brain contains neural progenitor cells with self-renewal and multi-lineage potential. The lineage and maturation of the neural progenitors are determined by the composition and levels of the trophic factors in their microenvironment. In Alzheimer disease (AD) brain, especially the hippocampus, the level of basic fibroblast growth factor (FGF-2) is markedly e...

In this cross-sectional study, we assessed the levels of neurotrophins (NF) of patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) in different stages of treatment and their relationship with OCD clinical features. Forty patients with OCD and 40 healthy controls had Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF), Nerve Growth Factor (NGF), and Glial Cell-Derived Neurotrophic Factor (GNDF) plasma levels...

It has been shown that abnormalities in axonal transport occur in several mouse models with motoneuron degeneration and also in the human disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. In this report, we have examined the potential of neurotrophic factors to act on axonal transport properties in a mouse mutant, progressive motor neuronopathy (pmn). This mouse mutant has been characterized as a "dying-b...

Neurotrophic factors (NTs) are secreted proteins that regulate survival and differentiation of nerve cells. Nerve growth factor (NGF), the first discovered NT, together with brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), neurotrophin-3 (NT3 ) and neurotrophin-4/5 (NT-4/5), form the classical family of NTs. However, many other growth factors, which are effective also outside the nervous system, such ...

Despite intensive research effort, no effective pharmacological therapies for Parkinson’s disease (PD) have been developed. However, with the development of efficient gene delivery systems, gene therapy for PD has become a focus of research, and increasing evidences suggest that continuous production of neurotrophic factors plays a significant role in the functional restoration of the nigrostri...

PURPOSE To investigate neurotrophic growth factors and corresponding receptors in human and rabbit corneal epithelium and stroma. METHODS Transcription of nerve growth factor (NGF), neurotrophin 3 (NT-3), NT-4, brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), glial cell line- derived neurotrophic factor (GDNF), and receptors Trk A-E, was investigated by reverse transcription-polymerase chain reactio...