NF1 and central nervous system cancer: Though it is unknown why gliomas preferentially occur in the optic nerve, there is evidence of heterogenous astrocyte expression of NF-1 (Yeh et al., 2009), region specific effects of NF1 on astrocyte differentiation (Lee da et al., 2010), subtype astrogliosis (Rizvi et al., 1999) and differential responses from the local environment (Simmons et al., 2011) which may all play some role.