Novel epigenetic clock for fetal brain development predicts prenatal age for cellular stem cell models and derived neurons.

ABSTRACT: Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) and their differentiated neurons (iPSC-neurons) are a widely used cellular model in the research of the central nervous system. However, it is unknown how well they capture age-associated processes, particularly given that pluripotent cells are only present during the earliest stages of mammalian development. Epigenetic clocks utilize coordinated age-associated changes in DNA methylation to make predictions that correlate strongly with chronological age. It has been shown that the induction of pluripotency rejuvenates predicted epigenetic age. As existing clocks are not optimized for the study of brain development, we developed the fetal brain clock (FBC), a bespoke epigenetic clock trained in human prenatal brain samples in order to investigate more

SUBMITTER: Steg LC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8236187 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature