Update on Neuronal Vitality with PTEN Deletion

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February 2017

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Oswald Steward

A high magnification view of a PTEN immunostained section using phase-contrast microscopy from the brain of a mouse one year following neonatal conditional PTEN deletion in the motor cortex. Phase imaging was used to verify the presence of large layer V PTEN negative "ghost cells", which appear blue in this image. Neighboring PTEN positive neurons are stained brown and are visibly smaller than the ghost cells.

We reported in the last issue on Erin Gutilla's paper on long-term consequences of PTEN deletion (Gutilla et al., 2016). The paper had just been released electronically, but at that time, we didn't know that it had been selected as the cover image for the Journal. This is a nice highlight of our research! View the published paper here.

Erin, who is an MD/PhD student, is completing her dissertation research in the spring. In addition to the paper above, she was invited to submit a review for the journal “Neural Regeneration Research”. This is another nice recognition of the impact and importance of her discoveries.

The review summarized our findings that deleting PTEN in young (or developing) neurons in the way that enabled axon regeneration didn't seem to be harmful. Even more important, neurons lacking PTEN appeared more robust and healthy than other neurons more than 1 year after the intervention. Erin's dissertation research is following up on this very interesting finding. She'll complete her PhD research in the spring and then back to medical school. Look forward to further updates in our next newsletter.

If you would like to review the scientific article click this link.

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Gutilla, E.A., Buyukozturk, M.M., Steward, 0. (2016) Long-term consequences of conditional genetic deletion of PTEN in the sensorimotorcortex of neonatal mice. Exp. Neurol. 279, 27-39

Gutilla, E. A., and Steward, 0 . (2016) Selective neuronal PTEN deletion: Can we take the brakes off of growth without losing control? Neural Regeneration Research. 11(8): 1201-1203.

http://www.nrronline.org/temp/NeuralRegenRes1181201-3554224_005914.pdf