Abstract
Mature mammalian brains consist of variety of neuronal and non-neuronal cell types, which are progressively generated from embryonic neural progenitors through the embryonic and postnatal periods. However, it remains unknown whether all embryonic progenitors equivalently contribute to multiple cell types, or individual neural progenitors have variable potentials to generate specific cell types in a stochastic manner. Here, we performed population-level tracing of mouse embryonic neural progenitors by using Tol2-mediated genome integration vectors. We identified that neural progenitors in early embryonic stages predominantly contribute to cortical or subcortical neurons than astrocytes, ependymal cells, and neuroblasts in the postnatal brain. Notably, neurons and astrocytes were cumulatively labeled by the increase of total labeled cells, suggesting constant neurogenic and gliogenic potentials of individual neural progenitors. On the contrary, numbers of labeled ependymal cell are more fluctuated, implicating intrinsic variability of progenitor potentials for ependymal cell generation. Differential progenitor potentials that contribute to neurons, astrocytes, and ependymal cells were also detected in the developing avian pallium. Our data suggest evolutionary conservations of coherent and variable potentials of neural progenitors that generate multiple cell types in the developing amniote brain.
Highlights
Mature vertebrate brains comprise enormous number of neuronal and non-neuronal cells, from which complex neuronal circuits are assembled to produce higher-ordered behavioral and cognitive functions
A certain number of progenitors in the ventricular zone (VZ) were selectively labeled with EGFP (EGFPonly), suggesting that these cells were permanently labeled by successful genomic integration of the reporter vector
To trace sibling cell types derived from these labeled neural progenitors, we examined electroporated brains at postnatal day 34 (P34), allowing sufficient time for the generation of neuronal and glial cells from embryonic neural progenitors
Summary
Mature vertebrate brains comprise enormous number of neuronal and non-neuronal cells, from which complex neuronal circuits are assembled to produce higher-ordered behavioral and cognitive functions. We identified that neural progenitors in the early stages of the mouse telencephalon predominantly contribute to cortical or subcortical neurons rather than astrocytes, ependymal cells and neuroblasts in the rostral migratory stream (RMS).
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