Characterization of a human fetal spinal cord stem cell line, NSI-566RSC, and its induction to functional motoneurons.

ABSTRACT: Specific neuronal subtypes, especially motoneurons (MNs), derived from human stem cells provide a significant therapeutic potential for spinal cord diseases, such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and spinal cord injury. So far, in vitro, MNs have only been successfully induced from embryonic stem cells (hESC) and human fetal cortical progenitors. Although neural progenitors from spinal cord would be a likely source for generating MNs, there has been no study reporting successful in vitro differentiation of MNs from spinal cord progenitors. This study first characterized a polyclonal spinal cord stem cell line isolated from an 8 week-old fetus. Then a paradigm was introduced to successfully induce MNs from this cell line, which was demonstrated by immunostaining using the MN markers H

SUBMITTER: Guo X 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2908506 | biostudies-literature | 2010 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature