PUBLICATION
Pioneer axons employ Cajal's battering ram to enter the spinal cord
- Authors
- Nichols, E.L., Smith, C.J.
- ID
- ZDB-PUB-190206-6
- Date
- 2019
- Source
- Nature communications 10: 562 (Journal)
- Registered Authors
- Smith, Cody
- Keywords
- none
- MeSH Terms
-
- Zebrafish/anatomy & histology*
- Neural Crest/cytology
- Ganglia, Spinal/anatomy & histology
- Ganglia, Spinal/cytology
- Models, Biological
- Spinal Cord/anatomy & histology*
- Spinal Nerve Roots/anatomy & histology*
- Spinal Nerve Roots/cytology
- Animals
- Axons
- PubMed
- 30718484 Full text @ Nat. Commun.
Citation
Nichols, E.L., Smith, C.J. (2019) Pioneer axons employ Cajal's battering ram to enter the spinal cord. Nature communications. 10:562.
Abstract
Sensory axons must traverse a spinal cord glia limitans to connect the brain with the periphery. The fundamental mechanism of how these axons enter the spinal cord is still debatable; both Ramon y Cajal's battering ram hypothesis and a boundary cap model have been proposed. To distinguish between these hypotheses, we visualized the entry of pioneer axons into the dorsal root entry zone (DREZ) with time-lapse imaging in zebrafish. Here, we identify that DRG pioneer axons enter the DREZ before the arrival of neural crest cells at the DREZ. Instead, actin-rich invadopodia in the pioneer axon are necessary and sufficient for DREZ entry. Using photoactivable Rac1, we demonstrate cell-autonomous functioning of invasive structures in pioneer axon spinal entry. Together these data support the model that actin-rich invasion structures dynamically drive pioneer axon entry into the spinal cord, indicating that distinct pioneer and secondary events occur at the DREZ.
Genes / Markers
Expression
Phenotype
Mutations / Transgenics
Human Disease / Model
Sequence Targeting Reagents
Fish
Orthology
Engineered Foreign Genes
Mapping