http://dx.doi.org/10.5607/en.2011.20.2.85 Exp Neurobiol. 2011 Jun;20(2):85-91. pISSN 1226-2560 • eISSN 2093-8144 Original Article Microarray Screening for Genes Involved in Oligodendrocyte Differentiation in the Zebrafish CNS Ah-Young Chung1, Suhyun Kim1, Ho Kim1,Young-Ki Bae2 and Hae-Chul Park1* 1Graduate School of Medicine, Korea University, Ansan 425-707, 2Research Institute, National Cancer Center, Goyang 410-769, Korea Within the vertebrate nervous system, myelination is required for the normal function of neurons by facilitating the rapid conduction of action potentials along axons. Oligodendrocytes are glial cells which myelinate axons in the central nervous system. Disruption of myelination and remyelination failure can cause human diseases such as multiple sclerosis. Despite the importance of myelination, the molecular basis of oligodendrocyte differentiation and myelination are still poorly understood. To understand the molecular mechanisms which regulate oligodendrocyte differentiation and myelination, novel genes were identified using a microarray analysis. The analysis used oligodendrocyte lineage cells isolated from transgenic zebrafish expressing fluorescent proteins in the oligodendrocyte lineage cells. Seven genes not previously known to be involved in oligodendrocyte differentiation were identified, and their expression during oligodendrocyte development was validated. Key words: oligodendrocyte, differentiation, myelination, microarray, zebrafish INTRODUCTION The insulation of axons in the vertebrate nervous system by myelin is essential for efficient axonal conduction, and is thus required for the normal function of neurons. Oligodendrocytes are glial cells which myelinate axons in the central nervous system (CNS), and are generated from oligodendro-cyte progenitor cells (OPCs). In the developing spinal cord, OPCs are generated from the pMN precursor domain of the ventral spinal cord. OPCs express olig2, a basic helix-loop-helix transcription factor (Park et al., 2002b; Zhou and Anderson, 2002), and differentiate into Received April 6, 2011, Accepted April 24, 2011 *To whom correspondence should be addressed. TEL: 82-31-412-6712, FAX: 82-31-412-6729 e-mail: hcpark67@korea.ac.kr Copyright © Experimental Neurobiology 2011. www.enjournal.org mature oligodendro-cytes after migration into the white matter of the spinal cord. The differentiation of oligodendrocytes and the myelination of axons is a highly regulated process controlled by a number of mechanisms, including extrinsic signaling pathways and intrinsic machinery. In the CNS, myelination disruption and re-myelination failure can cause demyelinating human diseases, such as multiple sclerosis (MS). Primary demyelination usually occurs by a direct insult to the oligodendrocytes, and secondary demyelination occurs as a consequence of primary axonal loss (Emery, 2010). Remyelination is the process by which new myelin sheaths are restored to demyelinated axons, enabling them to recover lost function. Although the vertebrate CNS has a very limited regeneration capacity, remyelination generally occurs efficiently. However, despite the efficiency of remyelination in experimental models and in some clinical diseases, remyelination is often inadequate in This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.