SPECIFICATION OF THE ANTEROPOSTERIOR NEURAL AXIS THROUGH SYNERGISTIC INTERACTION OF THE WNT SIGNALING CASCADE WITH NOGGIN AND FOLLISTATIN

Embryological data and the activities of the neural-inducing factors n oggin and follistatin are consistent with the hypothesis that the nerv ous system is initially induced with an anterior character, with subse quent signals imparting posterior pattern. We report that Xwnt3a is a candidate for involvement in anteroposterior neural patterning, as it synergizes with the neural-inducing factors noggin and follistatin to increase the expression of posterior neural genes. Furthermore we show that beta-catenin, an intracellular protein implicated in the Wnt sig nal transduction cascade, mimics the activity of Xwnt3a. These data su ggest that the generation of pattern within the vertebrate nervous sys tem may rely on synergism between a Wnt signaling pathway and multiple neural-inducing factors. (C) 1995 Academic Press, Inc.