Waves of early transcriptional activation and pluripotency program initiation during human preimplantation development.

ABSTRACT: The events regulating human preimplantation development are still largely unknown owing to a scarcity of material, ethical and legal limitations and a lack of reliable techniques to faithfully amplify the transcriptome of a single cell. Nonetheless, human embryology is gathering renewed interest due to its close relationship with both stem cell biology and epigenetic reprogramming to pluripotency and their importance in regenerative medicine. Carefully timed genome-wide transcript analyses of single oocytes and embryos uncovered a series of successive waves of embryonic transcriptional initiation that start as early as the 2-cell stage. In addition, we identified the hierarchical activation of genes involved in the regulation of pluripotency. Finally, we developed HumER, a database of huma

SUBMITTER: Vassena R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4074286 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature