Identification of nerve growth factor receptors in primary cultures of chick neural crest cells

Primary cultures of chick neural crest cells obtained from explanted neural tubes have binding sites for radioiodinated nerve growth factor ([125I]NGF) but not for radioiodinated epidermal growth factor ([125I]EGF). The binding of [125I]NGF was shown to be a specific and saturable process with a high affinity (Kd = 0.3 nM) for the ligand. Despite the expression of these NGF binding sites, incubation of the neural crest cultures with nerve growth factor did not induce neurite outgrowth; no morphological alterations were observed. This was not due to an inability of the cells to express a neuronal phenotype, since the neural crest cells spontaneously differentiated into neurite-bearing cells. However, the nerve growth factor binding sites do appear to be functional receptors, since nerve growth factor could produce a modest induction of ornithine decarboxylase. The quantity of nerve growth factor binding sites seemed to be independent of the phenotype expressed by the neural crest cells, since both pigmented cells and neuron-like neural crest cells exhibited binding. These findings suggest that the differentiation of neural crest cells into mature nerve growth factor-responsive neurons may involve the coupling of nerve growth factor receptors to cellular responses important in the expression of the neuronal phenotype.