Guidance of Neuronal Growth Cones: Selective Fasciculation in the Grasshopper Embryo

Abstract

One of the central questions of developmental neurobiology concerns how the diversity and specificity of individual neurons are generated during embryonic development. One major component of neuronal diversity is the complex axonal morphology of individual neurons, largely generated early in development and intimately involved in the ability of neurons to find their correct synaptic targets. By a process of precise pathfinding, growth cones find the appropriate neurons or muscle cells, often by traveling long distances along stereotyped routes that involve a series of cell-specific choices and turns.