Differentiation of human olfactory bulb-derived neural stem cells towards oligodendrocyte

In the central nervous system, oligodendrocytes are the glial element in charge of myelin formation. Obtaining an overall presence of oligodendrocyte precursor cells/oligodendrocytes. (OPCs/OLs) in culture from different sources of NSCs is an important research area, because OPCs/OLs may provide a promising therapeutic strategy for diseases affecting myelination of axons. The present study was designed to differentiate human olfactory bulb NSCs (OBNSCs) into OPCs/OLs and using expression profiling (RT-qPCR) gene, immunocytochemistry and specific protein expression to highlight molecular mechanism(s) underlying differentiation of human OBNSCs into OPCs/OLs. The differentiation of OBNSCs was characterized by a simultaneous appearance of neurons and glial cells. The differentiation medium, containing cAMP, PDGFA, T3, and all-trans-retinoic acid (RA), promotes OBNSCs to generate mostly oligodendrocytes displaying morphological changes and appearance of long cytoplasmic processes. OBNSCs showed, after five days in oligodendrocytes differentiation medium, a considerable decrease in the number of nestin positive cells, which was associated with a concomitant increase of NG2 immunoreactive cells and few O4(+)-OPCs. In addition, a significant up regulation in gene and protein expression profile of stage specific cell markers for OPCs/OLs (CNPase, Galc, NG2, MOG, OLIG1, OLIG2, MBP), neurons and astrocytes (MAP2, ?-TubulinIII, GFAP) and concomitant decrease of OBNSCs pluripotency markers (Oct4, Sox2, Nestin), was demonstrated following induction of OBNSCs differentiation. Taken together, the present study demonstrate the marked ability of a cocktail of factors containing PDGFA, T3, cAMP and ATRA, to induce OBNSCs differentiation into OPCs/OLs and shed light on the key genes and pathological pathways involved in this process. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.