title: Turning back the clock on neural progenitors.
abstract: Drosophila neural progenitor cells, or neuroblasts, alter their transcriptional profile over time to produce different neural cell types. A recent paper by Pearson and Doe shows that older neuroblasts can be reprogrammed to behave like young neuroblasts, and to produce early neural cell types, simply by expressing the transcription factor, Hunchback. The authors show that competence to respond to Hunchback diminishes over time. Manipulating neural progenitors in this way may have important implications for therapeutic uses of neural stem cells.
authors.affiliation: Wellcome/Trust Cancer Research UK Gurdon Institute and Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, UK. ahb@mole.bio.cam.ac.uk
authors.forename: Adrian R
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Carr
authors.forename: Semil P
authors.initials: SP
authors.lastname: Choksi
authors.forename: Andrea H
authors.initials: AH
authors.lastname: Brand
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D019070:Cell Lineage; D004268:DNA-Binding Proteins / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D029721:Drosophila Proteins / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D004331:Drosophila melanogaster / Q000166:cytology* / Q000196:embryology* / Q000378:metabolism; D009420:Nervous System / Q000166:cytology / Q000196:embryology; D009474:Neurons / Q000166:cytology* / Q000378:metabolism; D013234:Stem Cells / Q000166:cytology* / Q000378:metabolism; D014157:Transcription Factors / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*
chemical_list: D004268:DNA-Binding Proteins; D029721:Drosophila Proteins; D014157:Transcription Factors; C061245:hb protein, Drosophila