Updated project metadata. Peripheral nerve injuries due to physical insults or chronic diseases are quite common, yet no pharmacological therapies are available for the effective repair of injured nerves. The slow growth rate of adult nerves and insufficient access to growth factors pose major hurdles in timely reinnervating target tissues and restoring functions after nerve injuries. A better understanding of the molecular changes that occur during the immediate regenerative reprogramming of neurons, stated here as in vivo priming, following nerve injury may reveal ideal candidates for future therapies. Hence, molecular profiling of neuronal soma within the first week of nerve injury has been the gold standard for revealing molecular candidates critical for nerve regeneration. A complementary in vitro regenerative priming approach was recently shown to induce enhanced outgrowth in adult sensory neurons. In this work, we exploited the in vitro priming model to reveal novel candidates for adult nerve regeneration. We performed the whole tissue proteomics analysis of in vitro primed DRGs and compared their molecular profile with that of the in vivo primed, and control DRGs. Through this approach, we identified several commonly and uniquely altered molecules in the in vitro and in vivo primed DRGs that have the potential to modulate adult nerve regrowth. We further validated the growth inducing potential of mesencephalic astrocyte-derived neurotrophic factor (MANF), one of the hits identified in our proteomics analysis, in primary adult sensory neurons. Overall, this study showed that in vitro priming partially reproduces the molecular features in in vivo primed adult sensory neurons. The shortlisted candidates presented here from the two priming approaches may serve as potential therapeutic targets for adult nerve regeneration.