Fate map of the diencephalon and the zona limitans at the 10-somites stage in chick embryos

The diencephalon is a central area of the vertebrate developing brain, where the thalamic nuclear complex, the pretectum and the anterior tegmental structures are generated. It has been subdivided into prosomeres, which are transversal domains defined by morphological and molecular criteria. The zona limitans intrathalamica is a central boundary in the diencephalon that separates the posterior diencephalon (prosomeres I and 2), from the anterior diencephalon (prosomere 3). This intrathalamic limit appears early on in neural tube development, and the molecular pattern that it reveals suggests an important role in the diencephalic histogenesis. We hereby present a fate map of the presumptive territories in the diencephalon of a chick embryo at the 10-11 somite stages (HH9-10), by homotopic and isochronic quail-chick grafts. The anatomical interpretation of chimeric brains was aided by correlative whole-mount in situ hybridization with RNA probes for chicken genes expressed in specific diencephalic territories. The resulting fate map describes the distribution of the presumptive diencephalic prosomeres in the neural tube, and demonstrates their topologically conserved relationships throughout the neural development. Moreover, we show that the presumptive epithelium of ZLI can be localized at early developmental stages in the diencephalic alar plate at the anterior limit of the Wnt8b gene expression domain. (C) 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.