WASHINGTON (AP) - Injections of neural stem cells, a so-called master cell that can mature into any type of brain tissue, may be able to restore neurons killed by Alzheimer's and other diseases that affect the whole brain, studies with mice suggest.

"The neural stem cell has the ability to become a whole range of cell types in the brain," said [Evan Snyder], the lead author of a study appearing tomorrow in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "The neural stem cell can accommodate all different regions of the brain and insert itself appropriately into the fabric of the brain."

Snyder said his team injected the stem cells into the brains of newborn shiverer mice. The injected stem cells apparently detected the absent gene in the mice and converted into oligodendrocytes, which are brain cells that produce myelin.