Development
|
Molluscs have long proven to be excellent
models
for the study of both neurophysiology and development. However,
while
other 'simple systems' are being used extensively in research on neural
development, very little is currently known about how molluscs develop
their nervous systems.
Our own early work on this topic involved studies
by former graduate students, R. Marois and B.J. Chiasson, on embryonic
and postembryonic development of serotonergic cells in the snail, Lymnaea.
This work was later complemented by doctoral research by M.W. Baker,
who
investigated the role for serotonin in mediating injury induced
sprouting
within the snail nervous system. Subsequently, E.E. Voronezhskaya, an
exchange
student from Moscow, used antibodies against tubulin and the
neuropeptide,
FMRFamide, to describe what we believe are the earliest neurons to
develop
in the embryonic snail. In collaboration with Hungarian colleagues, we
also described the development of catecholaminergic neurons from their
first appearance during embryogenesis to their distribution in adult
specimens.
One of my current graduate students, A.J.G.
Dickinson, has recently provided immunocytochemical evidence for
the
existence of neurocalcin, a calcium handling protein, within early
developing
neurons and has also developed a technique for culturing embryonic Lymnaea
in vitro, thus permitting a more experimental approach to our
developmental
studies. Ms. Dickinson has also been working on early neural
development
in Ilyanassa, another snail which has long been used in studies
of the mechanisms of development |
