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Neural stem cell pools in the vertebrate adult brain: Homeostasis from cell-autonomous decisions or community rules?

Nicolas DrayEmmanuel Than-TrongLaure Bally-Cuif
Published in: BioEssays : news and reviews in molecular, cellular and developmental biology (2020)
Adult stem cell populations must coordinate their own maintenance with the generation of differentiated cell types to sustain organ physiology, in a spatially controlled manner and over long periods. Quantitative analyses of clonal dynamics have revealed that, in epithelia, homeostasis is achieved at the population rather than at the single stem cell level, suggesting that feedback mechanisms coordinate stem cell maintenance and progeny generation. In the central nervous system, however, little is known of the possible community processes underlying neural stem cell maintenance. Recent work, in part based on intravital imaging made possible in the adult zebrafish, conclusively highlights that homeostasis in neural stem cell pools may rely on population asymmetry and long-term spatiotemporal coordination of neural stem cell states and fates. These results suggest that neural stem cell assemblies in the vertebrate brain behave as self-organized systems, such that the stem cells themselves generate their own intrinsic niche.
Keyphrases
  • stem cells
  • cell therapy
  • single cell
  • mental health
  • white matter
  • multiple sclerosis
  • mesenchymal stem cells
  • cerebral ischemia
  • photodynamic therapy
  • fluorescence imaging
  • blood brain barrier