MicroRNA-765 regulates neural stem cell proliferation and differentiation by modulating Hes1 expression

Neural stem cells (NSCs) are multipotent, self-renewing and undifferentiated cells that have the ability to differentiate to both glial and neuronal lineages. miRNAs act a key role in regulating neuronal fate and self-renewal of NSCs. In this study, we found that ectopic expression of miR-765 promoted NSCs proliferation. Moreover, miR-765 overexpression increased the ki-67 and β-tubulin-III expression inNSCs. Overexpression of miR-765 inhibited the expression of GFAP in NSCs. Furthermore, Hes1 was identified as a direct target gene of miR-765 in NSCs. Overexpression of Hes1 decreased miR-765-induced proliferation of NSCs and inhibited NSCs differentiation to neurons in miR-765-treated NSCs. These results demonstrated that miR-765 acted a crucial role in NSCs differentiation and proliferation by inhibiting Hes1 expression.