Histone deacetylases are critical components of transcriptional silencing mechanisms that regulate embryonic development. Recent work has shown that histone deacetylase 1 (hdac1) is required for neuronal specification during zebrafish CNS development. We show here that specification of oligodendrocytes, the myelinating cells of the CNS, also fails to occur in the hdac1 mutant hindbrain, but per...

Neurons and glia are thought to arise from multipotent and self-renewing stem cells, which comprise the majority of neuroepithelial cells in the ventricular zone (VZ) of the early embryonic CNS. However, this idea remains to be tested rigorously, because CNS stem cells have been identified only by using in vitro assays, from which their abundance in vivo cannot be directly inferred. In the hema...

7 2 ABSTRACT The molecular signals specifying neuronal, glial or multipotent precursors in the developing and adult central nervous system (CNS) are largely unknown. Radial glial cells have recently been discovered as major precursor population generating neurons or glial cells in separate lineages in the developing CNS. Towards this aim to identify the key molecular determinants for neurogenic...

objective: hippocampal insults have been observed in multiple sclerosis (ms) patients. fibroblast growth factor-2 (fgf2) induces neurogenesis in the hippocampus and enhances the proliferation, migration and differentiation of oligodendrocyte progenitor cells (opcs). in the current study, we have investigated the effect of fgf2 on the processes of gliotoxin induced demyelination and subsequent r...

In the developing spinal cord, early progenitor cells of the oligodendrocyte lineage are induced in the motor neuron progenitor (pMN) domain of the ventral neuroepithelium by the ventral midline signal Sonic hedgehog (Shh). The ventral generation of oligodendrocytes requires Nkx6-regulated expression of the bHLH gene Olig2 in this domain. In the absence of Nkx6 genes or Shh signaling, the initi...

To be presented for public examination with the permission of the Faculty of Para a minha família TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF ORIGINAL PUBLICATIONS i ABSTRACT ii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS iv INTRODUCTION 1 1. The development of telencephalon in mouse 1 1.1. Neural development within the telencephalon 2 1.1.1. Neurogenesis and cell migration within the dorsal telencephalon 3 Use of decloaking chamber-...

Insulinoma-associated1a (insm1a) is a zinc-finger transcription factor playing a series of functions in cell formation and differentiation of vertebrate central and peripheral nervous systems and neuroendocrine system. However, its roles on the development of motor neuron have still remained uncovered. Here, we provided evidences that insm1a was a vital regulator of motor neuron development, an...

Oligodendrocyte differentiation and myelination are tightly regulated processes orchestrated by a complex transcriptional network. Two bHLH transcription factors in this network, Olig1 and Olig2, are expressed exclusively by oligodendrocytes after late embryonic development. Although the role of Olig2 in the lineage is well established, the role of Olig1 is still unclear. The current studies an...