Notochord nucleus pulposus cells are characteristic of containing abundant and giant cytoplasmic vacuoles. This review explores the embryonic formation, biological function, and postnatal exhaustion of notochord vacuoles, aiming to characterize the signal network transforming the vacuolated nucleus pulposus cells into the vacuole-less chondrocytic cells. Embryonically, the cytoplasmic vacuoles ...

BACKGROUND Fate mapping studies have shown that progenitor cells of three vertebrate embryonic midline structures - the floorplate in the ventral neural tube, the notochord and the dorsal endoderm - occupy a common region prior to gastrulation. This common region of origin raises the possibility that interactions between midline progenitor cells are important for their specification prior to ge...

Expression of the Brachyury (Ci-Bra) gene of the ascidian Ciona intestinalis is initiated at the 64-cell stage. Gene expression is restricted to notochord precursor cells, and Ci-Bra plays a key role in notochord differentiation. In a previous study, nearly 50 cDNA clones for potential Ci-Bra-downstream genes that are expressed in notochord cells were isolated. The present determination, by who...

Using fate mapping techniques, we have analyzed development of cells of the dorsal marginal region in wild-type and mutant zebrafish. We define a domain in the early gastrula that is located just at the margin and centered on the dorsal midline, in which most cells generate clones that develop exclusively as notochord. The borders of the notochord domain are sharp at the level of single cells, ...

The spine is a segmented axial structure made of alternating vertebral bodies (centra) and intervertebral discs (IVDs) assembled around the notochord. Here, we show that, prior to centra formation, the outer epithelial cell layer of the zebrafish notochord, the sheath, segments into alternating domains corresponding to the prospective centra and IVD areas. This process occurs sequentially in an...

Notochord is an axial structure derived of embryonic mesoderm and in addition to structural supporting role in inducing nearby germinal layers, it has a basic role in formation of organs such as vertebral column, axial vessels, neural tube and primitive gut. This organ undergoes essential changes during the development process. First, arises from the primitive node and terms notochordal process...

The notochord is a rod-like embryological structure, which plays a vital role in the development of the vertebrate. Though embryological, remnants of this structure have been observed in the nucleus pulposus of the intervertebral discs of normal adults. Pathologically, these remnants can give rise to slow-growing and recurrent notochord-derived tumors called chordomas. Using standard search eng...

While the ventralizing factor Sonic hedgehog is expressed in the entire notochord (Development 121 (1995) 2537) the latter displays distinct ventralizing activities along its rostrocaudal axis. Hence, in HH stage-10 chicken embryo, the caudal notochord exhibits floor plate inducing capacities lost by rostral regions (Development 117 (1993) 205). Therefore, we hypothesize that the caudal notocho...