Effects of controlled delivery of FGF-2 on neural stem cell growth in vitro

""Neural stem cells (NSCs) are the self-renewing, multipotent cells that generate the main phenotypes of the nervous system. NSCs hold the promise for cell-based therapies in human neurodevelopmental and neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s dis- eases. Unfortunately, several con- cerns with NSC cultures currently may limit their therapeutic promise. One major problem is the inability to precisely control stem cell behavior in culture, such as proliferation and specification into different cell types. NSCs are grown in serum-free media supplemented with several hormones and cytokines. It has been established that the adult mouse forebrain con- tains NSCs that can be cultivated in vitro when EGF or FGF-2 or their combination is provided. In particu- lar, FGF-2 was shown to promote the growth rate of NSCs in vitro thereby maintaining their multilineage dif- ferentiation potential. However, FGF-2’s susceptibility to enzymatic degradation may limit its clinical applications. We evaluated whether a device containing heparan sulfate (HS), which is a co-factor in growth factor-mediated cell proliferation and differentiation, could potentiate and prolong the delivery of fibroblast growth factor-2 (FGF-2) and thus improve in vitro NSC cultivation. Our research showed that cultivation of NSCs in media with a controlled release of FGF-2 increased their pro-liferation rate, reduced the apoptosis and the senescence. In these experi- mental conditions NSCs preserve their stemness properties for a longer period of time compared with con- trols.""