The appearance and distribution of intermediate filament proteins during differentiation of the central nervous system, skin and notochord of Xenopus laevis.

Antibodies against various intermediate filament proteins have been used to follow cell differentiation in the early Xenopus embryo. Three new monoclonal antibodies against Xenopus cytokeratins raised against Triton-insoluble material from tadpoles (RD35/2a, RD35/3a and D3/3a), two antibodies against mammalian cytokeratins (LE65 and LP3K), monoclonal anti-(rat 200 K neurofilament protein), rabbit anti-(rat glial filament acidic protein), and rabbit antibodies to hamster and calf vimentin were used. We show that cytokeratins are present in the early central nervous system (CNS) and persist in the ependymal cells of the adult CNS. We also show that the notochord contains cytokeratin. The ontogeny of intermediate filament protein appearance in the CNS, skin and notochord between neural fold stage and swimming tadpole stage are described. These results are discussed in particular with regard to the use of the antibodies as differentiation markers.