Functional heterogeneity of embryonic stem cells revealed through translational amplification of an early endodermal transcript.

ABSTRACT: ES cells are defined as self-renewing, pluripotent cell lines derived from early embryos. Cultures of ES cells are also characterized by the expression of certain markers thought to represent the pluripotent state. However, despite the widespread expression of key markers such as Oct4 and the appearance of a characteristic undifferentiated morphology, functional ES cells may represent only a small fraction of the cultures grown under self-renewing conditions. Thus phenotypically "undifferentiated" cells may consist of a heterogeneous population of functionally distinct cell types. Here we use a transgenic allele designed to detect low level transcription in the primitive endoderm lineage as a tool to identify an immediate early endoderm-like ES cell state. This reporter employs a tandem ar

SUBMITTER: Canham MA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2876051 | biostudies-literature | 2010 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature