System_approaches_reveal_the_molecular_networks_involved_in_neural_stem_cell_differentiation-libre.pdf

Protein Cell 2012, 3(3): 213–224 DOI 10.1007/s13238-012-0014-4 *These authors contributed equally to the work. ? Higher Education Press and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2012 213 Protein Cell RESEARCH ARTICLE System approaches reveal the molecular networks involved in neural stem cell differentiation Kai Wang 1,5* , Haifeng Wang 2,5* , Jiao Wang 2,5* , Yuqiong Xie 1,5 , Jun Chen 3,4 , Huang Yan 1,5 , Zengrong Liu 5 , Tieqiao Wen 1,5 , 1 Laboratory of Molecular Neurobiology, School of Life Sciences, Shanghai University, Shanghai 200444, China 2 School of Communication and Information Engineering, Shanghai University, Shanghai 200444, China 3 College of Life Science, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China 4 College of Chemical Engineering and Technology, Wuhan University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430081, China 5 Institute of Systems Biology, Shanghai University, Shanghai 200444, China , Correspondence: tqwen@ Received December 20, 2011 Accepted January 12, 2012 ABSTRACT The self-renewal and multipotent potentials in neural stem cells (NSCs) maintain the normal physiological functions of central nervous system (CNS). The ab- normal differentiation of NSCs would lead to CNS dis- orders. However, the mechanisms of how NSCs differ- entiate into astrocytes, oligodendrocytes (OLs) and neurons are still unclear, which is mainly due to the complexity of differentiation processes and the limita- tion of the cell separation method. In this study, we modeled the dynamics of neural cell interactions in a systemic approach by mining the high-throughput ge- nomic and proteomic data, and identified 8615 genes that are involved in various biological processes and functions with significant changes during the differen- tiation processes. A total of 1559 genes are specifically expressed in neural cells, in which 242 genes are NSC specific, 215