Extended multipotency of neural crest cells and neural crest-derived cells

Neural crest cells (NCC) are migratory multipotent cells that give rise to diverse derivatives. They generate various cell types during embryonic development, including neurons and glial cells of the peripheral sensory and autonomic ganglia, Schwann cells, melanocytes, endocrine cells, smooth muscle, and skeletal and connective tissue cells of the craniofacial complex. The multipotency of NCC is thought to be transient at the early stage of NCC generation; once NCC emerge from the neural tube, they change into lineage-restricted precursors. Although many studies have described the clear segregation of NCC lineages right after their delamination from the neural tube, recent reports suggest that multipotent neural crest stem cells (NCSC) are present not only in migrating NCC in the embryo, but also in their target tissues in the fetus and adult. Furthermore, fully differentiated NCC-derived cells such as glial cells and melanocytes have been shown to dedifferentiate or transdifferentiate into other NCC derivatives. The multipotency of migratory and postmigratory NCC-derived cells was found to be similar to that of NCSC. Collectively, these findings support the multipotency or plasticity of NCC and NCC-derived cells.