Talk:Rostral migratory stream

Non-peer review
Hey guys, great job so far! You have found a great variety of sources and balanced their use. The writing is also very clear and concise. I can tell that you are closing in on the finished product, so here are a few final suggestions: Good luck! Stempera (talk) 22:48, 5 December 2011 (UTC)
 * The picture for rostral migratory stream isn't displaying (the caption is there, but the image is not)
 * Make sure when writing in-text citations, the punctuation comes first and then the reference (take a look at some other wiki articles if you need examples)
 * Instead of including the history/discovery in the intro, perhaps add a brief "history" section
 * Make sure it is clear within the "Cell biology" section how each of those cell types is relevant to the main topic of the RMS (always refer back to the RMS to maintain the focus). This could be accomplished with a short introductory section under the main heading "Cell biology"

Thanks for the tips. We have tweaked our article according to your helpful suggestions! Esimonelli (talk) 00:00, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Feedback 20:12, 6 December 2011 (UTC)
Please consider rewrite or simplification of the sentence cited by note 18. Your prose is graceful, otherwise. --Ancheta Wis (talk) 20:12, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Headers
On quick glance, I thought I would point out to the students working on this page that WP:MOS requires that section headers not be all capitalized, and should avoid repeating the title of the article. Thus, "Cell Biology of the RMS" should be "Cell biology", "Vascular Cells" should be "Vascular cells", etc. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:12, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

=Peer Review=

Proof reading & Additional Studies
First of all, I love the pictures that you have included throughout the article. They really help to give the reader a good grasp of the topic and it's relationship to the overall organism. The information throughout the article is good, but there are some parts (especially the opening paragraph) that are a bit overwhelming and information dense. Overall I think you should probably cite some references more (ex. in astrocytes section) and it would be interesting if you brought in research articles that have been conducted on some of these points such as the Robo receptor expression. You actually did incorporate a study in the 'other glial cells' section, making the section more concrete.

I really like the current research section, especially when you get into the debate of the RMS in humans. Can you find any pictures or figures from articles to illustrate the presence of the immature neuron chains in fetal and postnatal infants? In the first paragraph of 'other research', the information is present but choppily presented so it is harder for the reader to make the connections. You need to cite the direct quotes prior to the end of the paragraph. The end of the paragraph kind of goes into future research, but that should be it's own section and extend beyond just pharmaceuticals involving the RMS. Overall the article is very informative and there is a lot of information that you have presented and organized well; however, proof-reading and more citations will help to strengthen the article.

~ Meredith K. Kochmd (talk) 22:33, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Meredith-

Thanks so much for your comments. For the most part, we have incorporated your suggestions into the article. We worked on our citation issues. As far as the current research section, we worked on the chopiness section. Likewise, we cited within the essay instead of at the end of paragraphs. Finally, we divided the "Current Research Topic" into 4 sections with their own headings, one being the one you mentioned, pharmaceuticals. We will continue to proof read the article and we are currently in the process of looking for more images. It is hard to find images that we have the right to use. Thanks again! Pretkennedy (talk) 17:21, 13 November 2011 (UTC)pretkennedy

Peer Review
Hey Guys! I loved the page--it was extremely comprehensive and talked about the mechanistic ways in which neurons are generated in the subventricular zone and proceed to migrate to the olfactory bulb. The pictures you included were extremely useful--the tags accurately and effectively described exactly what was going on in each picture. I especially liked the picture of the dividing cells marked by BrdU in the RMS because that clearly shows neurogenesis and migration simultaneously. All of your sources seem really comprehensive as well (I see that you have a lot of reviews, which is really great). The only minor suggestion I have is to try to link more wiki pages to your article. Otherwise I think the article looks really great! Good work!Tilearci (talk) 00:44, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your feedback! Yeah, the pictures seem to be a common theme in all the articles...Pictures just seem to help everyone understand things. We will make some last minute changes to try to link more wiki pages. Thanks for your feedback!

Pretkennedy (talk) 01:34, 16 November 2011 (UTC)pretkennedy

Peer Review 3
First of all, I think this article is great! It reads very smoothly and is very well focused.

I have a suggestion regarding the second paragraph of the Introduction section. It seems to me that the most important idea to get out of this passage is your last phrase: “new neurons use the RMS to relocate.” I think your paragraph could be strengthened if you place this information at the beginning of the paragraph, so that the first and second paragraphs are linked through this idea. This change would also be a smoother transition into the topic of neurogenesis.

For the sake of clarity in the Vascular subsection of the Cell Biology section, I think you could consider changing the phrase “SVZ precursors” back to “SVS neural precursors” or something similar, so that it is still clear that you are discussing precursors to neurons in particular.

Out of curiosity, is it known what the “guidance molecules” are that you mention in the Other Gial Cells subsection of the Cell Biology section? This is interesting! Also out of curiosity, on which organism did Scranton (in the Pharmaceuticals subsection of the Current Research section) conduct his studies?

In the Age-Related Decline section of Current Research, it mentions that migration of developing neurons is well-documented in humans, but in the Existence in Humans subsection is says that the presence of an analogous RMS in humans has been difficult to identify. When I first read these sections, I felt a little confused – are both of these statements accurate? Do you mean that it has been well-documented that developing neurons migrate, but in a different pathway than the RMS? Overall, a good article!

-Reedich (talk) 18:28, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the advice! To respond to your first point, I agree that is the most important point and I was torn where to incorporate that. We had to describe the RMS a bit and also the fact that neurogenesis has been documented in mammalian brains before we could link the two. But I think you're right. We went in and tried to rework it a bit to emphasize that point more.

For your second point, done. Good advice.

Your 3rd point, also done.

Your final point, I think you might have misread the passage. It says the decline in neurogenesis and migration in humans has been well documented, while the RMS (growth and proliferation etc) is not well documented.

Tyler8014 (talk) 01:42, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

You're right, I misread the "decline of" part. I'm sorry for all the confusion! -Reedich (talk) 01:55, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review 4
Overall, this article is really good. I loved all of the images, especially how well the correlated with your article. The descriptions of all of the figures are really helpful to look at while reading through this page. You guys go into a lot of detail about RMS in rodents, but the section explaining RMS in humans could use the same amount of detail. I briefly read through one of the research articles used for "Existence in humans," called "Identification and characterization of neuroblasts in the subventricular zone and rostral migratory stream of the adult human brain," and learned that this process is explained in a fair amount of detail in the human brain. If you guys could find and include another image much like the one you have for RMS in rodents, it could make this article even more complete. Other than that, good job and good luck with everything!

Marcetk (talk) 19:39, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments Marcetk, we are currently looking for more articles to expand that section, the interesting thing is that researchers are truly in disagreement over the existence of the RMS in adult humans. I recently read an article that claimed to prove it had complete degenerated in the adult human brain (we could maybe even include this), however I think that finding some articles that talk about it maybe even in the infant brain could hopefully add to the reader's understanding. We will work on that and on finding new pictures. Thanks! Esimonelli (talk) 01:52, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review 5
Hi RMS group! Your article was incredibly detailed and full of information on the mechanics and structures related to the SVZ and RMS. You did a great job hyperlinking terms to other pages and the images you included were very informative. The captions were also very helpful in understanding the ideas being presented in the images. So here are some minor suggestions that I had while reading the article:

The first introduction paragraph could use a bit of sharpening – like what kind of pathway is RMS? Signaling pathway? Chemical pathway? The first few sentences are quiet wordy and could be broken up. For example perhaps the first three sentences could be revised as: “The rostral migratory stream (RMS) is a [what pathway?]pathway found in the brain of some animals in which neuronal precursors originating from the subventricular zone (SVZ) of the brain migrate to the main olfactory bulb (OB). This pathway has been studied in rodents, rabbits, squirrels and the rheusus monkey[1]. After reaching the OB, neurons differentiate into GABAergic interneurons as they are integrated into either the granule cell layer or periglomerular layer.”

I would just work on cleaning up and condensing some of those sentences. Likewise, try using more concise or direct verbs in sentences, such as “He was able to trace the migration of labeled cells from the SVZ into the main olfactory bulb. He also did some quantitative studies of the changing size of the rostral migratory stream in younger to older rats.” This could be shortened to “He traced the migration of labeled cells from the SVZ to the main olfactory bulb. He also conducted quantitative studies of the changing size of the rostral migratory stream in younger to older rats.”

Under the Astrocytes heading, could you explain what a “neurogenic niche” is? Is it a scientific term that can be linked to another Wikipedia article? Or could you briefly mention what you mean by this term? Could you also use a more specific heading instead of “Cell Biology”? Or perhaps “Cell biology of the SVZ” since cell biology is such a general term.

The “Migration mechanics” section included very thorough descriptions of the process and was explained very well (although I’m not sure how well the average Wikipedia user would understand all the technical terms!). The “Current Research” section was also very well described, clearly explaining the lack of studies of RMS in humans versus rodents because of the significantly less developed OB in humans.

A quick point under the“Pharmaceuticals” and “a7B1 integrin” headings: you don’t need to list the names of the researchers or where they studied if you already are citing them in the reference section. Simply giving the results of their study should suffice.

You all did a tremendous amount of research and it definitely shows! Keep up the great work!

-A Alexander. Alexanae (talk) 13:57, 16 November 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 136.167.251.237 (talk)

Thanks Alexanae for your comments. For starters, you weren't the first to suggest we clean up the first few sentences and we appreciate your feedback and have modified them so that they hopefully flow better. We also tried to specify what the RMS is but really it is just a pathway that cells migrate on, not a chemical or signaling pathway or anything else. Secondly, we did define a neurogenic niche so that our readers will be able to better understand that paragraph. Thirdly, originally we had titled that section to be cell biology of the RMS but were told that you shouldn't repeat the title of your article in a subtitle which is why it is now so vague. We have also modified those last few sections to just stick to the results. Thanks again!! Esimonelli (talk) 00:14, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review 6
As everyone else has mentioned you have really done a thorough job with this article. The images are all well placed and explained. I just want to mention a few things that you might need to clarify or look into regarding content. First, you did a great job explaining the chemoattractants and repellents through which the neurons and glia communicate during axon guidance through the RMS, but I was also wondering if there is specific cell-to-cell contact (between neurons) which guides the neurons in this zone. Usually expression of N-cadherin allows axons to form fascicles in other developmental neuron stages and allows them to travel together as a bundle to their destination and I was wondering if these adhesion molecules play a role here. Heres a link that I found through a quick google search that might offer more clarification: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19301425.

A second area to mention is the idea of the growth cone that neurons use during migration. There is already a wikipedia article for growth cone, but I think it would be worth mentioning because it plays an integral role in the movement of neurons. Also, growth cones can be connected to the chemoattractants and repellants because the binding of these molecules to receptors on the growth cone of the neuron are what cause the neuron to move. Talking about the growth cone would also allow you to go into more detail about the mechanism of attractants/repellants that are used in the RMS because they usually cause downstream changes in the actin found at the leading edge of the growth cone.

Some areas of clarification that I would suggest is maybe to briefly (in one or two sentences) clarify the difference between a neuroblast and a neuronal progenitor. These two terms are used throughout the article and the average reader may need some clarification on the timeline of a neuron and at which of these stages does it encounter the RMS. Secondly, in regards to the integrin protein (last section) I was sort of confused. It is written that this protein, when targeted by antibodies, can disrupt migration. It also says that this protein functions using the chemoattractant laminin, but when laminin was injected it drew neuroblasts away form their usual migration pathway. So I guess my question is: If laminin is needed for this protein to function but laminin disrupts the migration (function) of the neuron, is laminin good or bad? Maybe describing the mechanism would clear this up.

Finally, has this RMS pathway been studied in any other organisms that may rely heavily on a developed olfactory bulb?

I hope this helps. It looks like your team has done a great deal of research as noted by your sources and it shows in your article. This is a well written and informative page. Keep up the good work. -K. Melnick Melnickk (talk) 17:28, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for all your comments Melnickk.

First off, we had mentioned NCAM in our article but I guess did not directly link it to the chain migration of the neurons in the RMS. I hope that now we have cleared this up. Next, we acknowledged the importance of the growth cone in our article, however with the amount of depth we have already gone in to, we thought it best not to devote too much space to it. Thirdly, we have also clarified the integrin situation, we realized with your comment that it might not have been clear that the researchers injected laminin outside of the RMS so as to see how it affected their movement. Finally, we did mention in the first paragraph that the RMS has been studied in other animals (rabbits, monkeys, squirrels) however the primary research, and most of the new research is done in rats and mice as they are the easiest organisms to study. Esimonelli (talk) 00:40, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review 7
Excellent job at expanding this stub.

I really enjoyed the first figure because it gave a great overview of the RMS and complemented the general definition well. I thought that this was researched heavily and those efforts definitely show. Overall there is a lot of information in this article, and for readability sake, I would try to explain further or even give examples where you can. This problem rises mostly where there is less information known about RMS (which is nothing you can help). For instance, under Cell-signalling for Migration mechanics, you state, "it has been shown that the secreted molecule SLIT shows such a repelling effect on SVZ-derived precursors" this could be a great place to expand. You might be able to connect this point with a point in the "Current research" section and just explain a little more about what your sources (that you've already found) have said about SLIT. In general, this paragraph itself had a lot of sentences that begin in the same way (Furthermore,...Nevertheless,...More recently,"). It may be a personal preference but I think that you can create a better flow by mixing up the way you structure sentences. Another place where you can draw connection is the last sentence in the introduction, "There is still some ongoing debate about the extent of the RMS and adult SVZ neurogenesis of new neurons in humans[5]." I would also move this sentence to the end of the previous paragraph in the intro. You talk a little about neurogenesis in the "current research" category I would be interested in knowing about what scientists are starting to research specifically in regards to SVZ and the RMS.

Like you said, the RMS is not studied in humans but more in rodents and monkeys. Is there a way you can emphasize more of the purpose and function of the RMS? The pathway is not all that clear to me even though you have a lot of information about the cell biology and specific mechanisms.

Also, sometimes you use RMS and sometimes you type out "rostral migratory system". I would make that all the same.

I can understand that these topics have not been researched heavily, but keep up the good work. Your article is very impressive.

Okadala (talk) 04:42, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the insight. I went into as much detail as we could but tried to find as balance as this is a general overview and readers can look at the source material for more technical knowledge. We tried to give examples of research without overwhelming readers with things we feared would be off topic, eg they can read up on SLIT and its functions, we just linked it to the RMS. We have tried to rearrange a couple of things and reword the definition to really clarify what the RMS is and its importance, and we did move that sentence. Also, the RMS really is just a migratory pathway for new neurons, I'm not sure how to elaborate on that. Thanks for the help.

Tyler8014 (talk) 00:51, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Peer Review 8
Very thorough article. I especially liked the wording of the section "Current Research," which was easy to understand despite the complicated nature of the topic. Some suggestions: the sentence, "The importance of the RMS lies in its ability to refine and even change an animal's sensitivity to smells, which explains its importance and larger size in the rodent brain as compared to the human brain, as our olfactory sense is not as developed" seems to be the most significant point of the introduction, so it would help to put this sentence right after the first. Also in the introduction, "granule cell layer" and "periglomerular layer" can be turned into links, and I would even suggest including this sentence in the "Migration Mechanics" section, because of its wordiness. Lastly, the top right picture includes that the RMS is part of the telencephalon: maybe you can expand on what part of the brain this is, where the OB is found, etc. Choino —Preceding undated comment added 05:13, 17 November 2011 (UTC).

Thanks for your comments Choino! We moved around some of the sentences in the intro, hopefully that will help with the flow of things. We had also already tried to link the granule cell layer and the periglomerular layer but they either don't link correctly or don't exist. Finally, we added a little blurb about where the RMS was found in our Brief History section however we didn't feel that we should expand too much on the telencephalon or brain anatomy since it isn't truly applicable to our topic. Thanks again! Esimonelli (talk) 01:03, 7 December 2011 (UTC)