Appearance of nerve growth factor receptors on cultured neural crest cells

Light microscopic radioautography of differentiating quail neural crest cultures (1 to 2 weeks after explanation) incubated with Iodine-125-labeled nerve growth factor (125I-NGF) revealed that approximately 35% of the cells bound NGF. The binding was specific and saturable; it was blocked by an excess of nonradioactive NGF, and was not detected following incubation with biologically inactive 125I-NGF. In addition, the binding did not appear to be blocked or diminished by insulin. Cell cultures prepared from somites or notochord showed no specific binding of 125I-NGF. Melanocytes comprised approximately 10% of the cell population in these cultures and appeared to be unlabeled. The subpopulation of cells with NGF receptors that were morphologically similar to other non-melanocyte unlabeled cells present in the neural crest cultures are probably the targets of the factor during differentiation and development. In contrast, there was no evidence of 125I-NGF binding by premigratory neural crest (adherent to the isolated neural tube) or by early migratory neural crest cells (24 hr after explantation). Both of these types of neural crest cells are relatively undifferentiated. The cells of the neural tube were also unlabeled. The binding of 125I-NGF to differentiating neural crest cells was not noticeably diminished by a brief pretreatment with trypsin or Dispase, enzymes used in the isolation of neural tubes. Hence, the absence of NGF receptors on premigratory neural crest and early migratory neural crest cultures was not due to enzymatic alterations of the receptor. It seems, therefore, that receptors for NGF appear on neural crest cells during the time when these cells are acquiring their phenotypic characteristics.