Retinoic acid signaling is critical during the totipotency window in early mammalian development.

ABSTRACT: Totipotent cells hold enormous potential for regenerative medicine. Thus, the development of cellular models recapitulating totipotent-like features is of paramount importance. Cells resembling the totipotent cells of early embryos arise spontaneously in mouse embryonic stem (ES) cell cultures. Such '2-cell-like-cells' (2CLCs) recapitulate 2-cell-stage features and display expanded cell potential. Here, we used 2CLCs to perform a small-molecule screen to identify new pathways regulating the 2-cell-stage program. We identified retinoids as robust inducers of 2CLCs and the retinoic acid (RA)-signaling pathway as a key component of the regulatory circuitry of totipotent cells in embryos. Using single-cell RNA-seq, we reveal the transcriptional dynamics of 2CLC reprogramming and show that ES c

SUBMITTER: Iturbide A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8195742 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature