Neurogenesis in adult mammals, which only occurs in limited brain regions, depends on a postnatal stem cell niche (SCN) along the lateral ventricles. One component of this SCN is an epithelial layer consisting of ependymal cells and a subset of astrocytes that differentiate from radial glia soon after birth. Jacquet and co-workers now report that the expression of the forkhead transcription factor FoxJ1 is required for this important differentiation event in mice (see p. ). They also show that a subset of FoxJ1+ cells harvested from the SCN can self-renew and has neurogenic potential when cultured. Furthermore, they report that FoxJ1 regulates several genes that encode microtubule-associated proteins during early postnatal development and suggest that FoxJ1-dependent gene expression might control the transport of basal bodies to the surface of differentiating ependymal cells during the formation of the motile cilia that characterise these cells. Overall, these results provide new insights into how the adult SCN is established that could bring cell-based therapies for neural damage closer.
