Content area
Full text
About the Authors:
Cheol Lee
Affiliation: Program in Genomics of Differentiation, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America
Jingqiong Hu
Current address: Stem Cell Center, Wuhan Union Hospital, Wuhan, Hubei, China
Affiliation: Laboratory of Stem Cell and Neuro-Vascular Biology, Genetics and Developmental Biology Center, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America
Sherry Ralls
Affiliation: Program in Genomics of Differentiation, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America
Toshio Kitamura
Affiliation: Division of Cellular Therapy, Advanced Clinical Research Center, The Institute of Medical Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
Y. Peng Loh
Affiliation: Section on Cellular Neurobiology, Program on Developmental Neuroscience, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America
Yanqin Yang
Affiliation: DNA Sequencing and Genomics Core Facility, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America
Yoh-suke Mukouyama
* E-mail: [email protected] (YM); [email protected] (SA)
Affiliation: Laboratory of Stem Cell and Neuro-Vascular Biology, Genetics and Developmental Biology Center, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America
Sohyun Ahn
* E-mail: [email protected] (YM); [email protected] (SA)
Affiliation: Program in Genomics of Differentiation, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, United States of America
Introduction
In the postnatal mammalian brain, neural stem cells (NSCs) are retained in a unique compartment after embryonic development and generate new cells throughout the life of an animal. Under the normal condition, postnatal neurogenesis occurs only in two major neurogenic regions, the subventricular zone (SVZ) of the lateral ventricle and the subgranular zone (SGZ) of the dentate gyrus of the hippocampus [1]–[3]. While the cells in the non-neurogenic regions do not produce new cells in vivo, they can become neurogenic under proper culture conditions in vitro, indicating the importance of the permissive environment in which NSCs reside. Such a specialized microenvironment is called the NSC niche and provides the appropriate cues that regulate NSC behaviors, such as maintenance, self-renewal,...