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Nerve Growth Factor

Effects on CNS Neurons and on Behavioral Recovery from Brain Damage

  • Chapter
Pharmacological Approaches to the Treatment of Brain and Spinal Cord Injury

Abstract

Nerve growth factor (NGF) is a well-characterized protein that acts as a neurotrophic factor for catecholaminergic neurons of the peripheral sympathetic nervous system and for a subpopulation of peripheral sensory neurons. In the central nervous system, catecholaminergic neurons are not affected, but evidence obtained in recent years indicates that NGF acts as a neurotrophic factor for cholinergic neurons of the basal forebrain innervating cortex and hippocampus. Nerve growth factor affects survival, fiber growth, and expression of transmitter-specific enzymes by these cholinergic neurons. Intracerebral administration of NGF has been found in several studies to modify the behavioral recovery of animals from experimentally induced brain damage. Such effects were observed after lesions in target areas and areas of origin of forebrain cholinergic neurons (septum, fimbria-fornix, hippocampus, cortex) and also after lesions in hypothalamus, striatum, and nucleus accumbens, i.e., in areas not innervated by forebrain cholinergic neurons. The mechanisms mediating the behavioral effects of NGF and the possible involvement of central cholinergic and peripheral sympathetic neurons are discussed.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Neurophysiology and Biology of Behavior, Center of Neurochemistry, C.N.R.S., 67084, Strasbourg, France

    Bruno Will, Viviane Pallage & Guy Toniolo

  2. Department of Neurology, University of Miami Scholl of Medicine, Florida, 33101, Miami, USA

    Franz Hefti

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  1. Bruno Will
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  2. Viviane Pallage
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  3. Guy Toniolo
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  4. Franz Hefti
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Clark University, Massachusetts, Worcester, USA

    Donald G. Stein

  2. University of Munich, Munich, Federal Republic of Germany

    Bernhard A. Sabel

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© 1988 Plenum Press

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Will, B., Pallage, V., Toniolo, G., Hefti, F. (1988). Nerve Growth Factor. In: Stein, D.G., Sabel, B.A. (eds) Pharmacological Approaches to the Treatment of Brain and Spinal Cord Injury. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-0927-7_16

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-0927-7_16

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