Cellular and molecular aspects of striatal development
Section snippets
Introduction to the striatum
The striatum (also known as the dorsal striatum or neostriatum) consists of the caudate and putamen, two nuclei that develop from the same telencephalic primordium and together make up part of the basal ganglia. The basal ganglia consist of a collection of interconnected subcortical nuclei, namely, the striatum, subthalamic nucleus, internal and external segments of the globus pallidus and the substantia nigra (pars compacta and pars reticulata). Together, these nuclei form multiple loops
Organisation of the adult striatum
In humans and non-human primates, the caudate and putamen, which are histologically identical, are separated by the internal capsule, whose myelinated fibres give the nuclear complex a striated appearance. Anteriorly to the dorsal striatum lies the nucleus accumbens and part of the olfactory tubercle, which are now grouped together to form the ventral striatum. Cortical input is thought to be directed to these four components of the striatum (caudate nucleus, putamen, nucleus accumbens and
Striatal development—morphological considerations
Development of the nervous system as a whole begins with neural induction, during which a region of embryonic ectoderm is specified that will form the neural plate on the dorsal side of the embryo. Neurulation then occurs during which the neural plate forms the neural tube, which is lined by a pseudostratified columnar epithelium consisting of uncommitted precursor cells from which the future central nervous system will arise. Patterning of the neuroepithelium along the antero-posterior axis
Striatal development—developmental gene expression
Over the last few years, the involvement of several gene families encoding gene regulatory proteins have been identified as having a role in the differentiation of the VZ and SVZ neuronal precursors into striatal tissue, which not only has important implications in understanding the ontogeny of this system, but also for understanding disorders of the striatum and development of treatment strategies. Much of this work has employed mouse models, and its relevance to other mammalian systems
Striatal striosomes and matrix—developmental gene expression
The striatum is segregated into striosome and matrix compartments and these are known to be generated by two waves of neurogenesis, beginning at E12 in the rat. Cells born up to about E17 form the striosome compartment, while from E18 until the early postnatal period, a second wave of neurogenesis produces the matrix compartment [81]. The genesis of striatal striosome neurons coincides with the arrival of the first dopaminergic projections from the substantia nigra at E14. By E19 these dopamine
Development of the striatal interneurons
So far the development of the striatal projection neurons has been discussed. However, as previously described, the striatum also contains a variety of aspiny striatal interneurons which are implicated in regulating striatal projection function 44, 45 and which are found in both the striosome and matrix compartment.
There are four main classes of striatal interneuron (values in parentheses denotes size range of soma):
- 1.
Cholinergic neurons (20–50 μm)
- 2.
GABAergic neurons containing parvalbumin (10–35
Future prospects
In summary, development of the striatum can be divided into three major categories:
- 1.
Early striatal specification
- 2.
Development of the medium spiny projection neurons and striosome-matrix compartmentalisation
- 3.
Development of the striatal interneurons
For each category, a number of genes encoding transcription factors with a postulated role have been identified (see Table 1), but how these genes and their products interact is at present uncertain. However, the continued study of normal striatal
Acknowledgements
We are grateful to Carrie B. Hurelbrink for helpful comments on the manuscript. This work was supported by the British Medical Research Council (R.J.E.A., R.A.B. and A.E.R.) and Merck, Sharp and Dohme (M.J.).
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