Neural Crest - Peripheral Nervous System

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Cite this page: Hill, M.A. (2024, May 6) Embryology Neural Crest - Peripheral Nervous System. Retrieved from https://embryology.med.unsw.edu.au/embryology/index.php/Neural_Crest_-_Peripheral_Nervous_System

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Introduction

Human embryo neural crest cells (stage 11)

The neural crest are bilaterally paired strips of cells arising in the ectoderm at the margins of the neural tube. These cells migrate to many different locations and differentiate into many cell types within the embryo. This means that many different systems (neural, skin, teeth, head, face, heart, adrenal glands, gastrointestinal tract) will also have a contribution fron the neural crest cells.

In the body region, neural crest cells also contribute the peripheral nervous system (both neurons and glia) consisting of sensory ganglia (dorsal root ganglia), sympathetic and parasympathetic ganglia and neural plexuses within specific tissues/organs.

In the head region, neural crest cells migrate into the pharyngeal arches (as shown in movie below) forming ectomesenchyme contributing tissues which in the body region are typically derived from mesoderm (cartilage, bone, and connective tissue).General neural development is also covered in Neural Notes.

These projects are the sole work of undergraduate science students and may contain errors in fact or descriptions.

Historic Embryology - Neural Crest
1879 Olfactory Organ \| 1905 Cranial and Spinal Nerves \| 1908 10 mm Peripheral \| 1910 Mammal Sympathetic \| 1920 Human Sympathetic \| 1928 Cranial ganglia \| 1939 10 Somite Embryo \| 1942 Origin \| 1957 Adrenal

Some Recent Findings

The role of the transcription factor Rbpj in the development of dorsal root ganglia^[1] "The dorsal root ganglion (DRG) is composed of well-characterized populations of sensory neurons and glia derived from a common pool of neural crest stem cells (NCCs), and is a good system to study the mechanisms of neurogenesis and gliogenesis. Notch signaling is known to play important roles in DRG development, but the full scope of Notch functions in mammalian DRG development remains poorly understood."
Cranial neural crest migration: new rules for an old road.^[2] "In this review, we discuss recent cellular and molecular discoveries of the CNCC migratory pattern. We focus on events from the time when CNCCs encounter the tissue adjacent to the neural tube and their travel through different microenvironments and into the branchial arches. We describe the patterning of discrete cell migratory streams that emerge from the hindbrain, rhombomere (r) segments r1-r7, and the signals that coordinate directed migration."

Neural Crest Migration

<Flowplayer width="408" height="320" autoplay="true">Chicken-neural crest migration 01.flv</Flowplayer>

Chicken embryo sequence shows the migration of DiI-labeled neural crest cells towards the branchial arches as the embryo. White rings indicate migration of individual cells. Each image represents 10 confocal sections separated by 10 microns.

Movie Source: Original Neural Crest movies kindly provided by Paul Kulesa.^[3]

Development Overview

The following cranial and trunk data is based upon 185 serially sectioned staged (Carnegie) human embryos.^[4]

Cranial Neural Crest

stage 9 - an indication of mesencephalic neural crest
stage 10 - trigeminal, facial, and postotic components
stage 11 - crest-free zones are soon observable in rhombomere 1, 3, and 5
stage 12 - rhombomeres 6 and 7 neural crest migrate to pharyngeal arch 3 and then rostrad to the truncus arteriosus
stage 13 - nasal crest and the terminalis-vomeronasal complex are last of the cranial crest to appear

stages 9-14 - otic vesicle primordium descends

Trunk Neural Crest

Spinal ganglia increase in number over time and are in phase with the somites, though not their centre. There are 3 migratory pathways: ventrolateral between dermatomyotome and sclerotome, ventromedial between neural tube and sclerotomes, and lateral between surface ectoderm and dermatomyotome.