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Mst3b Promotes Spinal Cord Neuronal Regeneration by Promoting Growth Cone Branching Out in Spinal Cord Injury Rats

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Abstract

Spinal cord injury is a severe clinical problem, and research searching activity molecular that can promote spinal cord injury repairing is very prevalent. Mst3b can promote repair of damaged peripheral nerves and the optic nerve, but has been rarely reported in spinal cord injury research. Through detecting its expression in different periods of injured spinal cord, we found that the expression of Mst3b was significantly upregulated in injured spinal cord neurons. Increasing Mst3b expression using adenovirus in vivo and in vitro promoted axonal regeneration of spinal cord neurons, which led to behavioral and electrophysiological improvement. Downregulation of Mst3b level had the adverse effects. Increasing Mst3b expression in PC12 cells resulted in an elevation of P42/44MAPK and LIMK/Cofilin activation. These results identified Mst3b as a powerful regulator for promoting spinal cord injury recovery through the P42/44MAPK and LIMK/Cofilin signaling pathways.

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Acknowledgments

This study was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 81171142 to F.H. and No. 81001591 to H.H.), Science and Technology Development Planning Project of Shandong Province (No. 2013G0021816 to F.H.), and the Natural Science Foundation of Shandong (No. ZR2010HQ065 to H.H.). We thank Fengchan Han for technical assistance, Xiuli Zhang for the supporting cell line, and the Electron Microscope Center for the transmission electron microscope analysis.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Human Anatomy and Histology and Embryology, Otology & Neuroscience Center, Binzhou Medical University, 346 Guanhai Road, Laishan, Shandong Province, 264003, China

    Yuqiang Zhang, Ting Tian, Luping Zhang, Dongmei Zhao, Qianqian Wu, Yingwei Chang, Qingbo Wang, Shuai Zhou, Guoying Feng & Fei Huang

  2. Neurology Department, General Hospital of Jinan Military Command, Jinan, Shandong Province, 250000, China

    Huaiqiang Hu

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  1. Yuqiang Zhang
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Correspondence to Fei Huang.

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Yuqiang Zhang and Huaiqiang Hu contributed equally to this work.

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Zhang, Y., Hu, H., Tian, T. et al. Mst3b Promotes Spinal Cord Neuronal Regeneration by Promoting Growth Cone Branching Out in Spinal Cord Injury Rats. Mol Neurobiol 51, 1144–1157 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12035-014-8785-7

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