Search results for "reprogramming"

Una visión integral del cáncer (II). Campos de estudio y biomarcadores emergentes

2019

Pathology and clinical oncology work hand in hand so that techniques and treatments, biomarkers and antibodies share the common goal of identifying integral new treatment regimens that are more effective and less aggressive. Evidence shows how tissue mechanics affect carcinogenesis and that tumor heterogeneity depends on metabolic stromal alteration and the Warburg effect of malignant cells, regulated directly by PD-1, becoming a target for immunotherapy. Proliferation and apoptosis depend on mitochondrial dysfunction in tumor cells, determining the grade of chemo/radio-resistance. The status of intestinal microbiota regulates immune response, tumor microenvironment structure and oncologic …

Brains in metamorphosis: reprogramming cell identity within the central nervous system

2014

During embryonic development, uncommitted pluripotent cells undergo progressive epigenetic changes that lock them into a final differentiated state. Can mammalian cells change identity within the living organism? Direct lineage reprogramming of cells has attracted attention as a means to achieve organ regeneration. However, it is unclear whether cells in the CNS are endowed with the plasticity to reprogram. Neurons in particular are considered among the most immutable cell types, able to retain their class-specific traits for the lifespan of the organism. Here we focus on two experimental paradigms, glia-to-neuron and neuron-to-neuron conversion, to consider how lineage reprogramming has ch…

Reprogramming of Pericyte-Derived Cells of the Adult Human Brain into Induced Neuronal Cells

2012

SummaryReprogramming of somatic cells into neurons provides a new approach toward cell-based therapy of neurodegenerative diseases. A major challenge for the translation of neuronal reprogramming into therapy is whether the adult human brain contains cell populations amenable to direct somatic cell conversion. Here we show that cells from the adult human cerebral cortex expressing pericyte hallmarks can be reprogrammed into neuronal cells by retrovirus-mediated coexpression of the transcription factors Sox2 and Mash1. These induced neuronal cells acquire the ability of repetitive action potential firing and serve as synaptic targets for other neurons, indicating their capability of integrat…

Transcriptional Mechanisms of Proneural Factors and REST in Regulating Neuronal Reprogramming of Astrocytes

2015

Summary Direct lineage reprogramming induces dramatic shifts in cellular identity, employing poorly understood mechanisms. Recently, we demonstrated that expression of Neurog2 or Ascl1 in postnatal mouse astrocytes generates glutamatergic or GABAergic neurons. Here, we take advantage of this model to study dynamics of neuronal cell fate acquisition at the transcriptional level. We found that Neurog2 and Ascl1 rapidly elicited distinct neurogenic programs with only a small subset of shared target genes. Within this subset, only NeuroD4 could by itself induce neuronal reprogramming in both mouse and human astrocytes, while co-expression with Insm1 was required for glutamatergic maturation. Cu…

Sox2-Mediated Conversion of NG2 Glia into Induced Neurons in the Injured Adult Cerebral Cortex

2014

Summary The adult cerebral cortex lacks the capacity to replace degenerated neurons following traumatic injury. Conversion of nonneuronal cells into induced neurons has been proposed as an innovative strategy toward brain repair. Here, we show that retrovirus-mediated expression of the transcription factors Sox2 and Ascl1, but strikingly also Sox2 alone, can induce the conversion of genetically fate-mapped NG2 glia into induced doublecortin (DCX)+ neurons in the adult mouse cerebral cortex following stab wound injury in vivo. In contrast, lentiviral expression of Sox2 in the unlesioned cortex failed to convert oligodendroglial and astroglial cells into DCX+ cells. Neurons induced following …

New Directions for Use of Systemic Drug Delivery in Anti-aging Medicine

2020

Abstract Anti-aging medicine has become a popular topic in recent years. It considers biological aging a revertible process that physiologically serves no posi tive function. Different technologies in systemic delivery and various strategies that characterize and optimize the performance of systemic delivery have been covered in this book. These technologies are essential for the establishment of a technical platform for interventive biogerontology. As the last chapter of this book, we would like to highlight some directions for future applications of systemic drug delivery in anti-aging medicine. We believe that biological aging and aging-related diseases are strongly associated with genet…

2013

Cortical function is impaired in various disorders of the central nervous system including Alzheimer’s disease, autism and schizophrenia. Some of these disorders are speculated to be associated with insults in early brain development. Pericytes have been shown to regulate neurovascular integrity in development, health and disease. Hence, precisely controlled mechanisms must have evolved in evolution to operate pericyte proliferation, repair and cell fate within the neurovascular unit (NVU). It is well established that pericyte deficiency leads to NVU injury resulting in cognitive decline and neuroinflammation in cortical layers. However, little is known about the role of pericytes in pathop…

Clinical and immunological aspects of microRNAs in neonatal sepsis

2022

Abstract Neonatal sepsis constitutes a highly relevant public health challenge and is the most common cause of infant morbidity and mortality worldwide. Recent studies have demonstrated that during infection epigenetic changes may occur leading to reprogramming of gene expression. Post-transcriptional regulation by short non-coding RNAs (e.g., microRNAs) have recently acquired special relevance because of their role in the regulation of the pathophysiology of sepsis and their potential clinical use as biomarkers. ~22-nucleotide of microRNAs are not only involved in regulating multiple relevant cellular and molecular functions, such as immune cell function and inflammatory response, but have…

Reawakening the sleeping beauty in the adult brain: neurogenesis from parenchymal glia

2015

Life-long neurogenesis is highly restricted to specialized niches in the adult mammalian brain and therefore the brain's capacity for spontaneous regeneration is extremely limited. However, recent work has demonstrated that under certain circumstances parenchymal astrocytes and NG2 glia can generate neuronal progeny. In the striatum, stroke or excitotoxic lesions can reawaken in astrocytes a latent neurogenic program resulting in the genesis of new neurons. By contrast, in brain areas that fail to mount a neurogenic response following injury, such as the cerebral cortex, forced expression of neurogenic reprogramming factors can lineage convert local glia into induced neurons. Yet, injury-in…

Manipulating mtDNA in vivo reprograms metabolism via novel response mechanisms.

2019

Mitochondria have been increasingly recognized as a central regulatory nexus for multiple metabolic pathways, in addition to ATP production via oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS). Here we show that inducing mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) stress in Drosophila using a mitochondrially-targeted Type I restriction endonuclease (mtEcoBI) results in unexpected metabolic reprogramming in adult flies, distinct from effects on OXPHOS. Carbohydrate utilization was repressed, with catabolism shifted towards lipid oxidation, accompanied by elevated serine synthesis. Cleavage and translocation, the two modes of mtEcoBI action, repressed carbohydrate rmetabolism via two different mechanisms. DNA cleavage activ…