Nerve Cell Biology
Front cover: differential interference contrast micrograph of a
hippocampal neuron 12-18 h after axonal outgrowth starts. The
nuclear indentation is arrowed. Taken from the paper by Dotti and
Banker.
ISBN: 0 948601 30 2
Nerve Cell Biology
Proceedings of the joint British Society for Cell Biology British Society for Developmental Biology Symposium
Leeds, April 1991
Organized and Edited by
Dennis Bray
King’s College, London
Nigel Holder
King’s College, London
Roger Keynes
University of Cambridge
Andrew Lumsden
University of London
Hugh Perry
University of Oxford
SUPPLEMENT 15
1991
JOURNAL OF CELL SCIENCE
Published by THE COMPANY OF BIOLOGISTS LIMITED, Cambridge
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Higher Order S tructure in th e Nucleus
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The Cell Surface in Plant Growth and Developm ent
Nerve Cell Biology
Edited by Dennis Bray, Nigel Holder, Roger Keynes, A ndrew Lumsden
and Hugh Perry
ISBN: 0 948601 30 2 approx. 134 pp.
P roceedings of the joint British Society for Cell B iology - British Society
for Developmental Biology Symposium
This series of supplem entary casebound volum es deals with topics of outstanding
interest to cell and m olecular biologists
These are provided free to subscribers to Journal o f Cell Science. They may be purchased separately from:
Portland Press Ltd, PO Box 3 2 , C o m m e rce W ay, C o lc h e s te r C 0 2 8H P , UK
Preface
In recent years, the British Society for Cell Biology (BSCB)
and the British Society for Developmental Biology (BSDB),
have held their Annual Meetings conjointly, an arrange­
ment that has brought many benefits in terms of increased
numbers of participants and shared interests. Topics each
year have been selected independently by the two societies
and have not in general been coordinated, although there is
enough common ground to make most talks accessible to all.
In the 1991 Annual Meeting, however, the societies moved a
step closer by choosing the same topic for the two main
symposia - the proceedings of which are customarily pub­
lished as Supplements to Development and The Journal of
Cell Science. In conjunction with a third scientific society the Brain Research Association (BRA) - it was decided to
focus on the development of the nervous system, with special
emphasis on its cellular basis.
Neurobiology is inherently multidisciplinary, with signifi­
cant applications to everything from philosophy to physics.
It is an enormous area of research (the number of practising
neurobiologists world-wide far exceeds that of cell biologists
and developmental biologists combined) and many members
of BSDB and BSCB, and of course BRA, have a professional
interest in the nervous system. It seemed a valuable endeav­
our to try to bring these research workers together and to
bridge arbitrary divisions between subject matter and allow
common elements to emerge. The programme of invited
talks thus addressed everything from the molecular basis of
neuronal differentiation at the single cell level, to the
coordinated changes in large numbers of cells within an
embryo, and to the structure and function of mammalian
brain.
The study of nervous system development has, since its
inception a century ago, had as its proper concern the study
of nerve cells. The formation of nerve tracts and peripheral
nerves, the establishment of synaptic projections and even
the embryonic development of major aspects of gross anat­
omy, all have their origin in the behaviour, form and
biochemical identity of individual nerve cells. This cellular
aspect has in the past been most dramatically emphasized in
studies of invertebrate nervous systems, in which the same
nerve cell can often be identified from animal to animal and
its form and behaviour monitored over the course of develop­
ment. This area of current research was represented during
the meeting by talks on the development of segmental
identity in the leech and the early decisions in Drosophila
neurogenesis.
An even greater emphasis at this meeting, reflected in the
selection of papers published in the Supplement to Develop­
ment, was placed on the analysis of vertebrate nervous
systems and mammalian brain at the single cell level.
Pioneering work on the development of zebra fish spinal cord
allows, as in selected invertebrate systems, the form and fate
of single identified cells to be followed with development.
Other regions of the vertebrate nervous system are also
yielding valuable insights at the cellular level. Patterns of
gene expression and production of growth and survival
factors control cell diversity in the vertebrate brain as
elsewhere in the nervous system. The lineage of cells has
been monitored during chick hindbrain development and in
rat cerebral cortex. Multiple factors control cell fate and
\
\.
diversity in the vertebrate nervous system, and many of
these have been isolated and their mode of action analysed.
Cell biologists - on the other hand - begin with an interest
in individual cells and seek to learn how the molecules they
contain and interact with define their form and behaviour.
And yet, as is apparent in the collection of articles published
in the Supplement to the Journal o f Cell Science, when the
subject is nerve cells, then cellular properties have major
implications for the entire multicellular tissue. Properties
such as the differentiation of nerve cell precursors into a
myriad of subtypes, responses to extracellular matrix mol­
ecules, selective migration and intercellular signalling are
common to all living cells. But they find their highest and
most complex expression in the cells that make up the
nervous system.
Some of the most striking reports during the meeting
concerned the properties of single cells, individually isolated
in tissue culture. Studies of the migration of growth cones
over different surfaces, their collapse in contact with non­
permissive cells, the selective formation of dendrites and
axons, the establishment of synapses, and the modulation of
these with electrical activity - all have been studied with
single cells in vitro. In every case, attempts have been made
to analyse these properties at the molecular level. Thus the
differentiation of axons and dendrites is seen to be associated
with, and perhaps caused by, changes in microtubuleassociated proteins, whereas the guidance of growth cones
and the formation of synapses are both inextricably linked to
the cascades of cell signalling molecules.
One of the successes of this novel meeting was the
emergence of underlying themes and approaches common to
both developmental and cell biology. The second coming of
the light microscope, armed with computer analysis and
fluorescent probes, is revealed in every aspect of present-day
neurobiology. Light microscopes are today used to track
individual cells through the nervous system, to locate
specific molecules within cells, to monitor minute changes in
the morphology of growth cones and synapses. A second
leitmotif of the meeting was the application of recombinant
DNA technology and the new genetics to neurobiological
questions. We heard of master genes that control differen­
tiation and development in both invertebrate and vertebrate
nervous systems, of genetic manipulations used to dissect
development and to monitor lineages, and how at the
molecular level, recombinant DNA technology makes it
possible to identify, isolate and probe the function of the
molecules responsible for nervous system development.
The papers from this meeting, here published conjointly in
Development and Journal o f Cell Science Supplements,
relate to a host of biological problems, intellectual chal­
lenges and techniques. We hope they will attract the interest
of developmental biologists and cell biologists with many
different backgrounds and foster awareness of the central
importance of Developmental Nerve Cell Biology as a
discipline in its own right.
Hugh Perry
Andrew Lumsden
Roger Keynes
Nigel Holder
Dennis Bray
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ISBN: 0 948601 30 2