Description
Anamniotes, rodents and man maintain a pool of adult neural stem cells around the central canal in the spinal cord representing an attractive cellular source for endogenous repair. Cell diversity and genes specific for this niche are still ill-defined in mammals. To identify genes specifically expressed in the niche, we microdissected (with laser) the central canal region and the adjacent tissue in human and mice adult tissues. Total RNA was isolated and used to probe affymetrix microarrays