Narrowing in on neurogenesis

Although aberrant neurogenesis in adults has been implicated in multiple CNS disorders, finding suitable targets for modulating the process without significant side effects has been difficult. As a result, the majority of drugs on the market and in development for neurological conditions act on signaling in adult neurons and not on the process by which neural stem cells actually proliferate, migrate and differentiate.

Now, a quartet of papers reveal new mechanisms by which two key signaling molecules-mTOR and GSK3β-could be targeted to either decrease or increase neurogenesis.^1-4...