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Professor Arnold Kriegstein from UCSF visits the Institute of Biophysics

Author: MA Xiaoming Update time: 2012-12-04

On November 27th, Professor Arnold Kriegstein, Director of the Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regeneration Medicine and Stem Cell Research at the University of California, San Francisco, visited the Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences at the invitation of Professor Xiaoqun Wang. Professor Kriegstein’s visit is sponsored by the Chinese Academy of Sciences as part of the “CAS Senior International Scientists Visiting Professorships Program”.

Professor Kriegstein delivered a lecture on embryonic neurogenesis entitled “Neural stem and progenitor cells in human cortical development”. Firstly, Professor Kriegstein introduced the location of the four types of progenitor cells in the three zones that are related to human neocortical development. He focused on the division and differentiation of two neuronal stem cells, the radial glial cells of the ventricular and outer subventricular zones (vRG and oRG cells), and described a detailed model of how these cells contribute to the formation and expansion of the neocortex. He discussed the impact of cleavage plane orientation on the division of neuronal stem cells during embryonic neurogenesis. He also compared the structure and development of the neocortex among different species, particularly between humans and mice which are epitomes of gyrencephaly and lissencephaly, respectively.

Professor Kriegstein obtained his bachelor’s degree from Yale University, and his Ph.D. and M.D. from New York University under the instruction of Nobel laureate Eric Kendal. Research in his lab focuses on the way in which neural stem and progenitor cells produce neurons and ways in which this information can be used for cell-based therapies to treat diseases of the nervous system. His group discovered the crucial roles of both vRG and oRG cells in the formation of the neocortex, thereby challenging previous thinking that radial glial cells are only related to the migration of neurons. They have also recently discovered the existence of oRG cells in mice which do not have a subventricular zone. These findings greatly expand our understanding of embryonic cortical development.

During Professor Kriegstein’s visit, he will cooperate with IBP scientists in the studies of developmental mechanisms of neocortex using primates as experimental models. The aims of their research is to better understand the pathogenesis of neuro-malformation diseases (such as microcephaly and smooth brain disease) and neuropsychiatric disorders (such as epilepsy, autism, and schizophrenia), and to lay the theoretic foundation for the development of future clinical treatments.

 

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