New prospects for human stem-cell therapy in the nervous system

It would be of enormous benefit if human neural tissue could be generated in vitro as this would allow screening for neuroactive compounds, and provide a source of tissue for testing cellular and gene therapies for CNS disorders. It is now well established that pluripotent embryonic stem cells (ES cells) from the mouse can be propagated in culture and differentiated into a range of tissues, including neuronal and glial cells. In other studies, more-restricted neural stem cells have been isolated from both the developing and adult rodent brain. Current reports now describe similar pluripotent and neural stem cells cultured from human embryos. While the exact nature of these cells continues to be explored, they can be grown for extended periods of time while retaining the capacity for neuronal and glial differentiation. In some cases, they have been shown to integrate into the developing or damaged adult brain. This article reviews their biology, with a focus on the possible links between ES-cell and neural stem-cell technologies, and the strategies used to isolate and expand defined cell populations.