Transcriptome asymmetry within mouse zygotes but not between early embryonic sister blastomeres.

ABSTRACT: Transcriptome regionalization is an essential polarity determinant among metazoans, directing embryonic axis formation during normal development. Although conservation of this principle in mammals is assumed, recent evidence is conflicting and it is not known whether transcriptome asymmetries exist within unfertilized mammalian eggs or between the respective cleavage products of early embryonic divisions. We here address this by comparing transcriptome profiles of paired single cells and sub-cellular structures obtained microsurgically from mouse oocytes and totipotent embryos. Paired microsurgical spindle and remnant samples from unfertilized metaphase II oocytes possessed distinguishable profiles. Fertilization produces a totipotent 1-cell embryo (zygote) and associated spindle-enriched

SUBMITTER: VerMilyea MD 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3101998 | biostudies-literature | 2011 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature