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First published online May 1, 2006

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PouV proteins: conserving pluripotency

It is vital that vertebrates maintain cells in an undifferentiated state before gastrulation - but how do they do this? In mammals, the maintenance of embryonic stem (ES) cells and the inner cell mass (ICM) requires Oct4, a class V POU domain (PouV) protein. Now, on p. 2011, Gillian Morrison and Joshua Brickman show that the role of Oct4 in mammals is related to the ability of PouV to regulate multipotency in other vertebrates. They show that PouV depletion in Xenopus downregulates Bmp4, which is needed to maintain cells in a non-committed state. The authors transfected mouse ES cells lacking Oct4 with PouV proteins from several vertebrates and found that those from Xenopus and axolotl (but not zebrafish) were able to support long-term self-renewal. Furthermore, PouV proteins regulate similar genes in ES cells and Xenopus embryos. The authors conclude that the ability of mammalian Oct4 to maintain self-renewing ES cells is derived from a conserved role of PouV proteins to prevent premature commitment in the developing embryo.

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Related articles in Development:

Conserved roles for Oct4 homologues in maintaining multipotency during early vertebrate development

Gillian M. Morrison and Joshua M. Brickman
Development 2006 133: 2011-2022. [Abstract] [Full Text]  

This Article Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Related articles in Development Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?