Transplanting neurofibromatosis-1 gene knockout neural stem cells improve functional recovery in rats with spinal cord injury by enhancing the mTORC2 pathway

The poor survival and low efficiency of neuronal differentiation limits the therapeutic effects of transplanted neural stem cells in the treatment of spinal cord injury. Neurofibromatosis-1 (NF-1) is a tumor suppressor gene that restricts the rapid and abnormal growth and differentiation of neural cells. In the present study, lentiviral vectors were used to knock out NF-1, Ricotr (the core member of mTORC2) or NF-1+Ricotr in neural stem cells in vitro, and the NF-1, Ricotr or NF-1+Ricotr knockout neural stem cells were transplanted at the lesion site in a rat model of spinal cord injury (SCI). We first demonstrated that targeted knockout of NF-1 had an antiapoptotic effect and improved neuronal differentiation by enhancing the mTORC2/Rictor pathway of neural stem cells in vitro. Subsequently, transplanting NF-1 knockout neural stem cells into the injured site sufficiently promoted the tissue repair and functional recovery of rats with spinal cord injury by enhancing the survival and neuronal differentiation of grafted neural stem cells. Collectively, these findings reveal a prominent role of NF-1 in neural stem cell biology, which is an invaluable step forward in enhancing the benefit of neural stem cell-mediated regenerative cell therapy for spinal cord injury and identifies the transplantation of NF-1 knockout neural stem cells as a promising strategy for spinal cord injury.