Figure 3.

Acellular biomaterial approaches to redirect endogenous NPC migration to regions of injury. Experimental results from in vivo implantation of (A–E) HGF-containing gelatin hydrogel or (F–I) laminin-rich hydrogel. (A) Experimental design utilized by Nakaguchi et al. (159). (B) DCX-positive (green) cells in the SVZ and gelatin hydrogel injected into the striatum of a coronally-sectioned rat brain. (C) Coronal brain sections depicting a higher quantity of DCX-positive cells (green) in the striatum elicited by injection of HGF-containing hydrogel compared to a PBS-containing hydrogel or gelatin hydrogel alone. (D) Quantification of DCX-positive cells in the ipsilateral striatum (seen at least 50 microns from the ipsilateral SVZ). (E) Schematic illustrating that the HGF-containing hydrogel was more efficacious at recruiting new neurons to the injured striatum compared to injection of HGF alone. (F) Experimental design utilized by Fujioka et al. (104). Schematic illustrates the injection of a self-assembling laminin-rich hydrogel into the striatum following experimental stroke. (G) Quantification and (H,I) confocal microscopy images of DCX-positive cells (red) migrating along hydrogels with and without laminin (blue). A greater quantity of DCX-positive cells is seen migrating along the (I) laminin hydrogel compared to (H) the hydrogel without laminin (Cnt-hydrogel). Scale bars (B,C): 200 microns; (E): 20 microns. Reprinted with permission from Nakaguchi et al. (159) for (A–E) and Fujioka et al. (104) for (F–I). *p < 0.05.