Stimulation of cholinogenesis in human fetal nerve cell cultures

The aim of the study was to obtain a neural cell population enriched in culture with cholinergic neurons and their determined precursors. It has been established that the joint application of retinoic acid and acetylcholine appears to be the most efficient combination of neuroinductors, stimulating the differentiation of cholinergic neurons from neural stem cells. During the entire period of culturing, the amount of ChAT + -positive cells increased reliably to 21.1 ± 6.2% from 5.3 ± 2.9, whereas the ir concentration in the control samples was 9.1 ± 4.8% of the total cell count. The cell population enriched with cholinergic neurons and their determined precursors correlated well with the increased acetylcholinesterase activity. Thus, the addition of retinoic acid and acetylcholine stimulate both neurogenesis and cholinogenesis in human fetal neural stem cell cultures.