Differentiation is an epigenetic process which is installed by changes of transcriptional programs over successive cellular divisions. A number of studies have reported the effects of biochemical modifications of chromatin (DNA and chromatin proteins) on the regulation of transcription. Although, these studies are able to explain how transcription of a given gene is regulated (toward activation...

Naive pluripotency is manifest in the preimplantation mammalian embryo. Here we determine transcriptome dynamics of mouse development from the eight-cell stage to postimplantation using lineage-specific RNA sequencing. This method combines high sensitivity and reporter-based fate assignment to acquire the full spectrum of gene expression from discrete embryonic cell types. We define expression ...

ESCs (embryonic stem cells) are derived from the inner cell mass of pre-implantation embryos and are pluripotent, meaning they can differentiate into all of the cells that make up the adult organism. This property of pluripotency makes ESCs attractive as a model system for studying early development and for the generation of specific cell types for use in regenerative medicine and drug screenin...

Stem cell cultures can be derived directly from early developing embryos and indirectly from differentiated cells by forced expression of pluripotency transcription factors. Pluripotency genes are routinely used to characterize mammalian stem cell cultures at the molecular level. However, such genes have remained unknown in lower vertebrates. In this regard, the laboratory fish medaka is unique...

Embryonic stem cells (ESCs) can self-renew or differentiate into any cell type, a phenomenon known as pluripotency. Distinct pluripotent states, termed naive and primed pluripotency, have been described. However, the mechanisms that control naive-primed pluripotent transition are poorly understood. Here, we perform a targeted screen for kinase inhibitors, which modulate the naive-primed pluripo...

Mammalian embryonic stem cells (ESC) have a number of specific properties that make them a unique object of fundamental and applied studies. In culture, ESC can remain in an infinitely undifferentiated state and differentiate into descendants of all three germ layers - ectoderm, endoderm, and mesoderm - that is, they can potentially produce more than 200 cell types comprising the body of an adu...

The maintenance of pluripotency and specification of cellular lineages during embryonic development are controlled by transcriptional regulatory networks, which coordinate specific sets of genes through both activation and repression. The transcriptional repressor RE1-silencing transcription factor (REST) plays important but distinct regulatory roles in embryonic (ESC) and neural (NSC) stem cel...

Alternative splicing (AS) is a key process underlying the expansion of proteomic diversity and the regulation of gene expression. Here, we identify an evolutionarily conserved embryonic stem cell (ESC)-specific AS event that changes the DNA-binding preference of the forkhead family transcription factor FOXP1. We show that the ESC-specific isoform of FOXP1 stimulates the expression of transcript...

differentiation is an epigenetic process which is installed by changes of transcriptional programs over successive cellular divisions. a number of studies have reported the effects of biochemical modifications of chromatin (dna and chromatin proteins) on the regulation of transcription. although, these studies are able to explain how transcription of a given gene is regulated (toward activation...