Abstract
Mouse epiblast stem cells (mEpiSCs) are pluripotent stem cells derived from epiblasts of postimplantation mouse embryos. Their pluripotency is distinct from that of mouse embryonic stem cells (mESCs) in several cell biological criteria. One of the distinctions is that mEpiSCs contribute either not at all or at much lower efficiency to chimeric embryos after blastocyst injection compared to mESCs. However, here we showed that mEpiSCs can be incorporated into normal development after blastocyst injection by forced expression of the E-cadherin transgene for 2 days in culture. Using this strategy, mEpiSCs gave rise to live-born chimeras from 5% of the manipulated blastocysts. There were no obvious signs of reprogramming of mEpiSCs toward the mESC-like state during the 2 days after induction of the E-cadherin transgene, suggesting that mEpiSCs possess latent ability to integrate into the normal developmental process as its origin, epiblasts.
Publication types
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Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
MeSH terms
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Animals
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Blastocyst / cytology*
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Blastocyst / metabolism
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Cadherins / genetics*
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Cell Differentiation
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Cell Line
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Cells, Cultured
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DNA Transposable Elements
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Embryonic Stem Cells / cytology
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Embryonic Stem Cells / metabolism
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Female
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Gene Expression
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Genetic Vectors
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Germ Layers / cytology*
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Germ Layers / metabolism
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Male
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Mice
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Microinjections
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Pluripotent Stem Cells / cytology*
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Pluripotent Stem Cells / metabolism
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Pluripotent Stem Cells / transplantation
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Transgenes
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Transplantation Chimera / genetics*
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Transplantation Chimera / growth & development
Substances
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Cadherins
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DNA Transposable Elements
Grants and funding
This work was supported by the Research Program of Innovative Cell Biology by Innovative Technology (Cell Innovation) from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) of Japan and RIKEN (Center for Developmental Biology (CDB)) grant to H.N. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.