Diane Angonin

LINEAGE-SPECIFIC MANIPULATION OF SUBVENTRICULAR ZONE GERMINAL ACTIVITY FOR NEONATAL CORTICAL REPAIR

Boosting endogenous stem cells to promote tissue regeneration following a lesion remains one of the main challenge in regenerative medicine. A translational and pertinent way to promote recruitment of endogenous stem cells and/or progenitors of defined lineages is to use a pharmacological approach.

Perinatal hypoxia is a model for the study of premature birth as well as a model of perinatal cortical lesion. Indeed, it leads to degeneration, atrophy and delayed maturation of oligodendrocytes and cortical glutamatergic neurons responsible for long-term cognitive difficulties. Previous studies demonstrated a spontaneous but partial regeneration of those cell types following hypoxia.
Using this model, we first showed that endogenous neural stem cells from a very particular subdomain of the subventricular zone keep their competency to produce cortical glutamatergic neurons after birth. Moreover, we identified a small molecule boosting post-hypoxia cortical cellular repair.