There's no place like home - HGF-c-MET signaling and melanocyte migration into the mammalian cochlea

ABSTRACT During vertebrate embryonic development, neural crest cells arise from the border region between neural and non-neural ectoderm, migrate to various locations of the embryonic body and differentiate into diverse tissues. In the cochlea of the inner ear, the neural crest cell-derived melanocyte is an important component to form the stria vascularis, a non-sensory structure crucial for auditory function. Our recent conditional knockout study in the mouse indicates that in the absence of HGF-c-MET signaling, neural crest cells properly migrate and find the right region of the prospective stria vascularis in the cochlear epithelium, but fail to start incorporating into the epithelium. Our study has shed light on a homing issue of migrating cells that is evident during development, or in cancer cell metastasis.