File:Melanocyte Pathway.gif

Figure 5.

Development of the melanocyte lineage. (A) In mouse and chick embryos, early melanoblasts are derived from the neural crest and migrate dorsolaterally through the dermis between the somites and the developing epidermis. At later stages, they become epidermal, and a second wave is thought to differentiate from Schwann cell precursors associated with developing nerves, contributing to the adult melanocytes of the trunk, head and developing limbs. It is not clear whether the late population intercalates with or replaces the early population. (B) In zebrafish embryos, melanocytes migrate dorsolaterally and along nerves ventrally (purple) to form the embryonic pattern. Melanocyte stem cells (MSCs) are located at the DRG (marked by asterisk). Following metamorphosis or melanocyte ablation of the embryonic pattern, zebrafish glial-pigment cell progenitors proliferate and migrate along nerves to form the adult melanocyte stripes. MSCs specified in the developing embryo are the proposed source of metamorphic melanocytes of the adult.

Reference

Mort RL, Jackson IJ & Patton EE. (2015). The melanocyte lineage in development and disease. Development , 142, 620-32. PMID: 25670789 DOI.

Copyright

© 2015. Published by The Company of Biologists Ltd This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium provided that the original work is properly attributed

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