Neural Transplants in Mammals

Abstract

The basic techniques of neural transplantation have long been within the repertoire of the neuroscientist and have been productively employed to address many of the major questions in neurobiology. With some notable exceptions, the animal models for grafting studies have come from the amphibian and avian classes. Only within the last 6 years have experiments examining the properties of transplanted mammalian central nervous system (CNS) tissue become widespread. It is illustrative that more papers on mammalian CNS grafts were published in 1980 alone than were published in the entire first 60 years (1890–1950) of work in this area (see Fig. 1). The present volume surveys the state of the art of neural transplantation in vertebrates. In the present chapter, we trace the slow development of the field of mammalian brain cell transplantation and examine the reasons why, until recently, there has been a relative dearth of studies on mammals as compared to other vertebrate classes.

A scholar must review the old so as to find out what is new. Confucius, The Analects c. 500 B.C.

We have inhented the wisdom of the past, in Institutions and in Libraries. Most times we have chosen to disregard it and start afresh. George E. Brown, D-U.S. Congress In a speech at the Winter Conference on Brain Research; January 23, 1983