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Shh and Wnts, secreted by the floor and roof plate of the spinal cord, direct longitudinal growth of the axons from the adjacent ventral funiculus and cortico-spinal tract. Whether these midline cues influence the directionality of axons elongating in more lateral positions of the spinal cord is unexplored. Song and colleagues investigate this possibility and demonstrate that the location of descending raphe-spinal tract in the ventrolateral spinal cord is dictated by the simultaneous repellent activity of Shh gradients in both the anterior-to-posterior (A-P) and medial-to-lateral (M-L) axis.
A hallmark feature of pluripotent stem cells is the ability to proliferate indefinitely (immortal phenotype). Despite reactivation of telomerase during iPSC derivation, there exists considerable heterogeneity in telomere length amongst established iPSC cell lines. Both telomerase-dependent and -independent mechanisms have now been shown to be important for continuous self-renewal of iPSC via the maintenance or extension of telomere length.
Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) and the cell transdifferentiation technologies are providing powerful tools to generate patient-specific cells for research and therapeutic applications. Hepatocytes and pancreatic β cells are two endoderm-derived cell types drawing much attention due to their indispensable physiological functions and strong association with various diseases. Recent advances in hepatocyte and β cell transdifferentiation have provided valuable insights into how to regenerate and restore normal functions of liver and pancreas under pathological conditions.
Protein kinases are arguably the most tractable candidates for development of new therapies to treat cancer. Deep sequencing of breast cancer cell lines indicates each express 375 or so kinases, representing nearly 75% of the kinome. A rich network both downstream and upstream from key oncogenic kinases includes both tyrosine and serine/threonine kinases, giving plasticity and resiliency to the cancer cell kinome.
