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Max Planck researchers microinject complex mixtures of RNA in single neural stem and progenitor cells in tissue

A challenge in the field of neural stem cell biology is the mechanistic dissection of single stem cell behavior in tissue. Current methods of genetic manipulation, however, show a number of limitations: They do not allow researchers to change the level of a defined gene product on a truly acute time scale and are limited to very few genes at a time.

Researchers at the MPI-CBG in Dresden now established a new technique: They microinjected neural stem and progenitor cells in organotypic slice culture of embryonic mouse brain. These cells behaved like cells in their natural environment. Microinjection of single genes, recombinant proteins or complex mixtures of RNA was found to elicit acute and defined changes in the behavior and progeny fate of these cells. Thus, apical progenitor microinjection provides a new approach to acutely manipulating single neural stem and progenitor cells in tissue.

 

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Picture: Developing mouse brain (left) and a microinjection pipette (right). The bright "cloud" is a fluorescent dye. copyright: MPI-CBG Dresden