The research team led by SyNergy member Magdalena Götz, Chair of Physiological Genomics of the LMU Biomedical Center and Director of the Institute for Stem Cell Research (ISF) at the Helmholtz Zentrum München, set out to identify the factors that regulate the maintenance or differentiation of neural stem cells. To this end, the scientists isolated neural stem cells, which either self-renew and generate additional neural stem cells or differentiate. “We found that the AKNA protein is present in higher concentrations in stem cells that generate neurons,” explains ISF researcher German Camargo Ortega, first author of the study together with Dr. Sven Falk. “Our experiments showed that low levels of the AKNA protein cause stem cells to remain in the stem cell niche, whereas higher levels stimulate them to detach from the niche, thus promoting differentiation.”