Presentation Details
How to Fix a Broken Nose

James E Schwob.

Tufts University School of Medicine, Boston, MA, USA

Abstract


The well-known, life-long capacity of the peripheral olfactory system to maintain or regenerate the population of olfactory sensory neurons has its limits.  In humans, smell function deteriorates with age and as a consequence of multiple antecedent disease processes, including viral or bacterial infection, toxin exposure, and head trauma.  Common to all forms of olfactory dysfunction is a degradation of the composition/structure of the olfactory epithelium (OE) accompanied by abnormalities in connectivity with the olfactory bulb target.  Thus, potential strategies for repair of the olfactory periphery and restoration of smell function begin with an understanding of the nature of the pathological and pathophysiological causes of the disordered function. That knowledge informs attempts to halt and then reverse the consequences of the disease processes by regenerating the sensory periphery and its connectivity with the bulb.  Of necessity, the attempt to repair begins with the characterization of the two populations of neurocompetent stem cells of the OE – Globose Basal Cells (GBCs) and Horizontal Basal Cells (HBCs) – and the processes regulating their self-renewal and progenitor function.  Efforts are underway, with an eye to 1) maintaining adequate GBC stem cell capacity and 2) activating unhelpfully dormant HBCs by artificial means; both approaches aim to restore the full population of GBCs and their neuronal descendants when both have been depleted as a consequence of disease.  Progress toward that end gives us reason to hope that one or more candidate approaches will bear fruit in the not-too-distant future.

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