BMC Neuroscience BioMed Central Research article Open Access Both systemic and local application of Granulocyte-colony stimulating factor (G-CSF) is neuroprotective after retinal ganglion cell axotomy Tobias Frank†1, Johannes CM Schlachetzki†1, Bettina Göricke1,2, Katrin Meuer1, Gundula Rohde1,2, Gunnar PH Dietz1,2,3, Mathias Bähr1,2, Armin Schneider4 and Jochen H Weishaupt*1,2 Address: 1Department of Neurology, University Medical Center Göttingen, Robert-Koch-Strasse 40, 37075 Göttingen, Germany, 2DFG-Research Center for Molecular Physiology of the Brain (CMPB), Humboldtallee 23, Göttingen, Germany, 3H Lundbeck A/S, 2500 Valby, Denmark and 4Sygnis Bioscience, Im Neuenheimer Feld 515, 69120 Heidelberg, Germany Email: Tobias Frank -
[email protected]; Johannes CM Schlachetzki -
[email protected]; Bettina Göricke -
[email protected]; Katrin Meuer -
[email protected]; Gundula Rohde -
[email protected]; Gunnar PH Dietz -
[email protected]; Mathias Bähr -
[email protected]; Armin Schneider -
[email protected]; Jochen H Weishaupt* -
[email protected] * Corresponding author †Equal contributors Published: 14 May 2009 Received: 10 November 2008 Accepted: 14 May 2009 BMC Neuroscience 2009, 10:49 doi:10.1186/1471-2202-10-49 This article is available from: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2202/10/49 © 2009 Frank et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Abstract Background: The hematopoietic Granulocyte-Colony Stimulating Factor (G-CSF) plays a crucial role in controlling the number of neutrophil progenitor cells.