Abstract
Brachial plexus injury is a common clinical peripheral nerve trauma. A series of genes in motoneurons were activated in the corresponding segments of the spinal cord after brachial plexus roots axotomy. The spatial and temporal expression of these genes directly affects the speed of motoneuron axon regeneration and precise target organ reinnervation. In a previous study, we observed the overexpression of c-Jun in motoneurons of the spinal cord ventral horn after brachial plexus injury in rats. However, the relevance of c-Jun expression with respect to the fate of axotomy-induced branchial plexus injury in adult mice remains unknown. In the present study, we explored the function of c-Jun in motoneuron recovery after axotomy. We pre-injected small interfering RNA (siRNA) to knockdown c-Jun expression in mice and examined the effects of the overexpression of c-Jun in motoneurons after the axotomy of the brachial plexus in vivo. Axotomy induced c-Jun overexpression in the ventral horn motoneurons of adult mice from 3 to 14 days after injury. In addition, the pre-injection of siRNA transiently inhibited c-Jun expression and decreased the survival rate of axotomy-injured motoneurons. These findings indicate that the axotomy-induced overexpression of c-Jun plays an important role in the survival of ventral horn motoneurons in adult mice. In addition, the pre-injection of c-Jun siRNA through the brachial plexus stem effectively adjusts c-Jun gene expression at the ipsilateral side.
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29 February 2024
A Correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12031-024-02188-5
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The National Natural Science Foundation Council of China supported this study through research grants (grant nos. 31471030 and 81771325).
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Conceived and designed the experiments: L-hZ and F-hS. Performed the experiments: F-hS and Y-qL. Analyzed the data: F-hS, Y-qL, K-hZ, RF, Z-mL PLM, and YT. Contributed the reagents, materials, and analysis tools: F-hS YG Y-Hz X-X and RF. Drafted and revised the manuscript: L-hZ, Y-qL, Z-mLPLM and F-hS.
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The research was performed in accordance with the Chinese National Health and Medical Research Council (NHNRC) animal ethics guidelines. All procedures associated with the mice were approved through the Animal Experimentation Ethics Committee of Sun Yat-sen University.
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The authors declare that they have no competing interest.
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The original version of this article was published and the authors have found an error specifically on figure 4. Panels d and h are repetition images thus the author have provided corrected image.
The authors sincerely apologize for this oversight and recognize that it might cause confusion or misinterpretation among the readers and fellow researchers.
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Li, Yq., Song, Fh., Zhong, K. et al. Pre-Injection of Small Interfering RNA (siRNA) Promotes c-Jun Gene Silencing and Decreases the Survival Rate of Axotomy-Injured Spinal Motoneurons in Adult Mice. J Mol Neurosci 65, 400–410 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12031-018-1098-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12031-018-1098-y