More than two decades after the discovery of adult neurogenesis in humans, researchers still struggle to elucidate the underlying transcriptional and post-transcriptional mechanisms. RNA interference is a crucially important process in the central nervous system, and its role in adult neurogenesis is poorly understood. In this work, we address the role of Dicer-dependent microRNA biogenesis in neuronal differentiation of adult neural stem cells within the subventricular zone of the mouse brain. Loss of the Dicer1 gene in the tailless (Tlx)-positive cells did not cause the decline in their numbers, but severely affected differentiation. Thus, our findings identify yet another phenomenon associated with microRNA pathway deregulation in adult neural stem cells which might be of relevance both for neuroscience and clinical practice.

在发现人类成人神经发生后的二十多年里，研究人员仍在努力阐明潜在的转录和转录后机制。RNA干扰是中枢神经系统中至关重要的过程，人们对其在成人神经发生中的作用了解甚少。在这项工作中，我们解决了Dicer依赖的microRNA生物发生在小鼠脑室下区域内成人神经干细胞的神经元分化中的作用。骰子的损失1无尾（Tlx）阳性细胞中的基因没有导致其数量下降，但严重影响了分化。因此，我们的发现确定了成年神经干细胞中与microRNA通路失控相关的另一种现象，这可能与神经科学和临床实践都相关。