In mice, zygotic genome activation occurs at onset of the two-cell stage in embryonic development and coincides with the exit from totipotency. Our work shows that the transcription factor DUXBL participates in silencing part of the stage-specific two-cell-associated transcriptional program and is required for development to proceed.
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References
Aoki, F. Zygotic gene activation in mice: profile and regulation. J. Repro. Dev. 68, 79–84 (2022). A review of the process of zygotic genome activation in mouse embryos.
Guo, M. et al. Precise temporal regulation of DUX is important for embryo development. Cell Res. 29, 956–959 (2019). This paper shows how maintaining the expression of the two-cell-stage transcriptional program in embryos halts development.
Macfarlan, T. S. et al. Embryonic stem cell potency fluctuates with endogenous retrovirus activity. Nature 487, 57–63 (2012). This paper describes the existence of two-cell-like cells within ES cell cultures.
Hendrickson, P. G. et al. Conserved roles of mouse DUX and human DUX4 in activating cleavage-stage genes and MERVL/HERVL retrotransposons. Nat. Genet. 49, 925–934 (2017). This paper identified DUX as an activator of cleavage-specific genes that is able to induce expression of the two-cell-stage transcriptional program.
Ji, S. et al. OBOX regulates mouse zygotic genome activation and early development. Nature 620, 1047–1053 (2023). This paper reports on the crucial role of OBOX transcription factors during zygotic genome activation in mice.
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This is a summary of: Vega-Sendino, M. et al. The homeobox transcription factor DUXBL controls exit from totipotency. Nat. Genet. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41588-024-01692-z (2024).
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Exit from totipotency is controlled by DUXBL in mice. Nat Genet 56, 563–564 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41588-024-01690-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41588-024-01690-1
