Signaling regulations of neuronal regenerative ability

•Differential intrinsic regenerative ability of adult cortical neurons revealed by in vivo imaging analysis.•Evolutionarily conserved pathways in regulating axon regeneration.•Functional interactions among different pathways in regulating axon regeneration.

Different from physiological axon growth during development, a major limiting factor for successful axon regeneration is the poor intrinsic regenerative capacity in mature neurons in the adult mammalian central nervous system (CNS). Recent studies identified several molecular pathways, including PTEN/mTOR, Jak/STAT, DLK/JNK, providing important probes in investigating the mechanisms by which the regenerative ability is regulated. This review will summarize these recent findings and speculate their implications.