Newt‐derived extracellular vesicles drive mammalian neuron differentiation

Abstract

Newts have the extraordinary ability to regenerate amputated limbs, as well as damaged heart, nerve and retinal tissue. This remarkable ability relies on the ability of the newt to generate a cluster of cells at site on injury, called a blastema, which is made up of progenitor cells from multiple tissue types. The blastema then directs the proliferation of cells to form new tissue and then the differentiation of those blastemal cells into their mature cell fates. The initial formation of the blastema requires rapid innervation of wound area.We have discovered that newt myogenic precursor cells (A1 cells) secrete extracellular vesicles (EVs) that, like all mammalian cell types, contain RNA and protein cargo that can modulate the morphology and gene expression patterns of the recipient cells that take up EVs. However, these newt EVs contain messenger RNA for multiple nerve differentiation factors. Cultured mammalian dorsal root ganglion (DRG) neurons, a type of peripheral sensory neuron, respond to treatments of newt EVs through increased axon growth and the up‐regulation of genes involved in neural cell differentiation and nerve cell fate determination. We hypothesize that the newt cells are responding to isolated culture conditions as though tissue injury has occurred and secrete EVs to promote nerve growth to facilitate blastema formation.This abstract is from the Experimental Biology 2018 Meeting. There is no full text article associated with this abstract published in The FASEB Journal.