The researchers mapped the cell map and gene regulatory network of human hippocampal development

On January 16, nature published a research paper entitled "deciding the development of the human hippocampus" online This work system elucidates the gene expression regulatory network and cell fate determinants in the process of human hippopotamus somatic embryogenesis, draws a high-precision cell map, and analyzes the different cell types and key molecules and regulatory networks in the process of hippocampal development The hippocampus, which is developed from the medial area of the telencephalon, is a very important special structure in the brain Hippocampus is a part of limbic system, which plays an important role in information coding, short-term memory, long-term memory, spatial navigation and so on In addition, hippocampus is closely related to epilepsy, mental disorders, Alzheimer's disease and other pathological pathogenesis, which has attracted the widespread attention of clinical doctors and neuroscientists In Alzheimer's disease, the hippocampus is one of the first brain regions to be affected Early symptoms include memory loss and disorientation The development of hippocampus plays an irreplaceable role in the study of cell and molecular mechanism of memory formation Although hippocampus is an evolutionarily conservative organ in vertebrate brain, the cell and molecular characteristics of developing human hippocampus are still unknown In this study, the researchers sequenced 30416 single cells in the key developmental stage of the hippocampus from the 16th to 27th week of human embryonic period by high-throughput single cell transcriptome technology for the first time, and then divided the cells into 8 categories and 47 different cell subtypes by using the classic tsne analysis In addition, the dynamic development of the key neural stem cells was systematically studied to further clarify the development process of the dynamic changes of the hippocampus and the cellular basis and molecular mechanism of the formation of the memory function loop At the same time, this study combined with cross species platform, compared the key differences between human and rodent hippocampus in the process of hippocampal evolution from multiple perspectives, revealed the important key time nodes and key genes of hippocampal development in all directions and at multiple levels, and provided a strong foundation for clinical application and treatment of related diseases.