@article{6d74b223eca04702b6171000c73bf0c7,
title = "The netrins define a family of axon outgrowth-promoting proteins homologous to C. elegans UNC-6",
abstract = "In vertebrates, commissural axons pioneer a circumferential pathway to the floor plate at the ventral mid-line of the embryonic spinal cord. Floor plate cells secrete a diffusible factor that promotes the outgrowth of commissural axons in vitro. We have purified from embryonic chick brain two proteins, netrin-1 and netrin-2, that each possess commissural axon outgrowth-promoting activity, and we have also identified a distinct activity that potentiates their effects. Cloning of cDNAs encoding the two netrins shows that they are homologous to UNC-6, a laminin-related protein required for the circumferential migration of cells and axons in C. elegans. This homology suggests that growth cones in the vertebrate spinal cord and the nematode are responsive to similar molecular cues.",
author = "Tito Serafini and Kennedy, {Timothy E.} and Gaiko, {Michael J.} and Christine Mirzayan and Jessell, {Thomas M.} and Marc Tessier-Lavigne",
note = "Funding Information: Correspondence should be addressed to M. T.-L. We thank Cori Barg-mann, Sophia Colamarino, Lindsay Hinck, Gail Martin, and Marya Postner for comments on the manuscript. We thank Marysia Placzek and Jane Dodd for participating in initial experiments, Ellen Kuwana for expert technical assistance and DNA sequencing, Bill Wadsworth and Ed Hedgecock for communicating resutts prior to publication, David Julius and Keith Mostov for sharing equipment, Mary Anne Gawi-nowicz for amino acid analysis, Jean-Louis Vigne and Michael Skinner for advice and assistance with protein microsequencing. Leslie Taylor and Graham Redgrave for assistance with sequence analysis, Gordon Wong for the gift of pMT21, Toshiya Yamada for the gift of the E2.5 chick spinal cord cDNA library, and J. Michael Bishop for the gift of 9ElO culture supernatant. We thank the following people for assistance with embryonic brain dissections: Jon Alexander, Melanie Be-dolli, Sophia Colamarino, David Dieterich, Chen-Ming Fan, Stacey Harmer, Erika Kennedy, Ellen Kuwana, Pamela Landsman, David Leonardo, Saleem N&la, Kayvan Aoayaie, Karen Scaler, Michael Silver, Ram& Tabtiang, Gale Tang, Kimberly Tanner, and Jose de la Torre. Supported by grants to M. T.-L. from the Lucille P. Markey Charitable Trust, the Searle Scholars Program/Chicago Community Trust, the f&Knight Endowment Fund for Neuroscience, the Esther A. and Joseph Klingenstein Fund, and the Paralyzed Veterans of America Spinal Cord Research Foundation. T. S. was supported by National Institutes of Health training grant NS07067, a Bank of America-Giannini Foundation Fellowship, and an American Cancer Society Fellowship. T. E. K. is a Medical Research Council of Canada fellow. M. J. G. is a National Science Foundation predoctoral fellow. T. M. J. is an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. M. T.-L. was a Lucille P. Markey Scholar in Biomedical Science, and is currently an Assistant Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.",
year = "1994",
month = aug,
day = "12",
doi = "10.1016/0092-8674(94)90420-0",
language = "English (US)",
volume = "78",
pages = "409--424",
journal = "Cell",
issn = "0092-8674",
publisher = "Cell Press",
number = "3",
}