Studies on cellular components underlying the cortex development

2016 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 15K15015
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: General anatomy (including histology/embryology)
• Research Institution: Osaka University
• Principal Investigator: Sato Makoto 大阪大学, 連合小児発達学研究科, 教授 (10222019)
• Project Period (FY): 2015-04-01 – 2017-03-31
• Keywords: 神経科学 / マイクログリア / 脳・神経 / von Economo neuron / アルギニンメチル化酵素

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Microglia is a well-known scavenger in the brain. Several lines of evidence suggest that microglia plays a pivotal role for the brain development through its phagocytic activity. We here observed that there exist several phases in the ‘activated’ microglia in terms of its scavenging activities in contrast to previous notion that only two activation phases exist. Furthermore, we confirmed that an involvement of one type of protein arginine N-methyltransferases in the phase transition by newly generating N-methyltransferases-null cells using CRISPR/Cas system. In addition, we identified the equivalent cells of von Economo neurons in mice by observing von Economo neuron-specific gene expression. It is known that von Economo neurons, which had been found only in the insular cortex of the highly evolved anthropoids, play crucial role for PTSD pathophysiology. Our identification of von Economo neuron-equivalent cells in mice allow us to study the pathophysiology of PTSD experimentally.

Free Research Field

解剖学