Functional enhancer elements drive subclass-selective expression from mouse to primate neocortex.
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Mich JK
PROVIDER: S-EPMC8163032 | biostudies-literature |
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
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Project description:Viral genetictools that target specificbraincell types could transform basicneuroscienceand targeted gene therapy. Here, we use comparative open chromatin analysis to identify thousands of human-neocortical-subclass-specific putative enhancers from across the genome tocontrol gene expressionin adeno-associated virus (AAV) vectors. The cellular specificity of reporter expression from enhancer-AAVs is established by molecular profiling after systemic AAV delivery in mouse. Over 30% of enhancer-AAVs produce specific expression in the targeted subclass, including both excitatory and inhibitory subclasses. We present a collection ofParvalbumin(PVALB) enhancer-AAVs that show highly enriched expression not only in cortical PVALB cells but also in some subcortical PVALB populations. Five vectors maintain PVALB-enriched expression in primateneocortex. These results demonstrate how genome-wide open chromatin data mining and cross-species AAV validation can be used to create the next generation of non-species-restricted viral genetic tools.
2023-06-27 | GSE235997 | GEO
Project description:The evolutionary expansion of the neocortex in mammals has been linked to enlargement of the subventricular zone (SVZ) and increased proliferative capacity of basal progenitors (BPs), notably basal radial glia (bRG). The transcription factor Pax6 is known to be highly expressed in primate, but not mouse, BPs. Here, we demonstrate that sustaining Pax6 expression selectively in BP-genic apical radial glia (aRG) and their BP progeny of embryonic mouse neocortex suffices to induce primate-like progenitor behaviour. Specifically, we conditionally expressed Pax6 by in utero electroporation using a novel, Tis21-CreERT2 mouse line. This expression altered aRG cleavage plane orientation to promote bRG generation, increased cell-cycle re-entry of BPs, and ultimately increased upper-layer neuron production. Upper-layer neuron production was also increased in double-transgenic mouse embryos with sustained Pax6 expression in the neurogenic lineage. Strikingly, increased BPs existed not only in the SVZ but also in the intermediate zone of the neocortex of these double-transgenic mouse embryos. In mutant mouse embryos lacking functional Pax6, the proportion of bRG among BPs was reduced. Our data identify specific Pax6 effects in BPs and imply that sustaining this Pax6 function in BPs could be a key aspect of SVZ enlargement and, consequently, the evolutionary expansion of the neocortex.
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Project description:BackgroundEnhancers play an important role in morphological evolution and speciation by controlling the spatiotemporal expression of genes. Previous efforts to understand the evolution of enhancers in primates have typically studied many enhancers at low resolution, or single enhancers at high resolution. Although comparative genomic studies reveal large-scale turnover of enhancers, a specific understanding of the molecular steps by which mammalian or primate enhancers evolve remains elusive.ResultsWe identified candidate hominoid-specific liver enhancers from H3K27ac ChIP-seq data. After locating orthologs in 11 primates spanning around 40 million years, we synthesized all orthologs as well as computational reconstructions of 9 ancestral sequences for 348 active tiles of 233 putative enhancers. We concurrently tested all sequences for regulatory activity with STARR-seq in HepG2 cells. We observe groups of enhancer tiles with coherent trajectories, most of which can be potentially explained by a single gain or loss-of-activity event per tile. We quantify the correlation between the number of mutations along a branch and the magnitude of change in functional activity. Finally, we identify 84 mutations that correlate with functional changes; these are enriched for cytosine deamination events within CpGs.ConclusionsWe characterized the evolutionary-functional trajectories of hundreds of liver enhancers throughout the primate phylogeny. We observe subsets of regulatory sequences that appear to have gained or lost activity. We use these data to quantify the relationship between sequence and functional divergence, and to identify CpG deamination as a potentially important force in driving changes in enhancer activity during primate evolution.
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Project description:Genome-wide transcriptional profiling was used to characterize the molecular underpinnings of neocortical organization in rhesus macaque, including cortical areal specialization and laminar cell-type diversity. Microarray analysis of individual cortical layers across sensorimotor and association cortices identified robust and specific molecular signatures for individual cortical layers and areas, prominently involving genes associated with specialized neuronal function. Overall, transcriptome-based relationships were related to spatial proximity, being strongest between neighboring cortical areas and between proximal layers. Primary visual cortex (V1) displayed the most distinctive gene expression compared to other cortical regions in rhesus and human, both in the specialized layer 4 as well as other layers. Laminar patterns were more similar between macaque and human compared to mouse, as was the unique V1 profile that was not observed in mouse. These data provide a unique resource detailing neocortical transcription patterns in a nonhuman primate with great similarity in gene expression to human.
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Project description:The neocortex is a mammalian-specific structure that is responsible for higher functions such as cognition, emotion and perception. To gain insight into its evolution and the gene regulatory codes that pattern it, we studied the overlap of its active developmental enhancers with transposable element (TE) families and compared this overlap to uniformly shuffled enhancers. Here we show a striking enrichment of the MER130 repeat family among active enhancers in the mouse dorsal cerebral wall, which gives rise to the neocortex, at embryonic day 14.5. We show that MER130 instances preserve a common code of transcriptional regulatory logic, function as enhancers and are adjacent to critical neocortical genes. MER130, a nonautonomous interspersed TE, originates in the tetrapod or possibly Sarcopterygii ancestor, which far predates the appearance of the neocortex. Our results show that MER130 elements were recruited, likely through their common regulatory logic, as neocortical enhancers.
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Project description:Expression of sonic hedgehog (Shh) in the limb bud is regulated by an enhancer called the zone of polarizing activity regulatory sequence (ZRS), which, in evolution, belongs to an ancient group of highly conserved cis regulators found in all classes of vertebrates. Here, we examined the endogenous ZRS in mice, using genome editing to establish the relationship between enhancer composition and embryonic phenotype. We show that enhancer activity is a consolidation of distinct activity domains. Spatial restriction of Shh expression is mediated by a discrete repressor module, whereas levels of gene expression are controlled by large overlapping domains containing varying numbers of HOXD binding sites. The number of HOXD binding sites regulates expression levels incrementally. Substantial portions of conserved sequence are dispensable, indicating the presence of sequence redundancy. We propose a collective model for enhancer activity in which function is an integration of discrete expression activities and redundant components that drive robust expression.
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Project description:Here we present a computational model, Score of Unified Regulatory Features (SURF), that predicts functional variants in enhancer and promoter elements. SURF is trained on data from massively parallel reporter assays and predicts the effect of variants on reporter expression levels. It achieved the top performance in the Fifth Critical Assessment of Genome Interpretation "Regulation Saturation" challenge. We also show that features queried through RegulomeDB, which are direct annotations from functional genomics data, help improve prediction accuracy beyond transfer learning features from DNA sequence-based deep learning models. Some of the most important features include DNase footprints, especially when coupled with complementary ChIP-seq data. Furthermore, we found our model achieved good performance in predicting allele-specific transcription factor binding events. As an extension to the current scoring system in RegulomeDB, we expect our computational model to prioritize variants in regulatory regions, thus help the understanding of functional variants in noncoding regions that lead to disease.
| S-EPMC6744346 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Genome-wide transcriptional profiling allows characterization of the molecular underpinnings of neocortical organization, including cortical areal specialization, laminar cell type diversity and functional anatomy. Microarray analysis of individual cortical layers across sensorimotor and association cortices in rhesus macaque demonstrated robust and specific laminar and areal molecular signatures driven by differential expression of genes associated with specialized neuronal function. Gene expression corresponding with laminar architecture was generally similar across cortical areas, although genes with robust areal patterning were often highly laminar as well, and these patterns were more highly conserved between macaque and human as compared to mouse. Layer 4 of primate primary visual cortex displayed a distinct molecular signature compared to other cortical regions, a specialization not observed in mouse. Overall, transcriptome-based relationships were strongest between proximal layers in a cortical area, and between neighboring areas along the rostrocaudal axis, reflecting in vivo cortical spatial topography and therefore a developmental imprint. Tissue from male and female monkeys (n = 2-3 animals/gender) was collected from anterior cingulate gyrus (ACG), layers 2, 3, 5, 6; orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), layers 2, 3, 5, 6; dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), layers 2-6; primary motor cortex (M1), layers 2, 3, 5, 6; primary somatosensory cortex (S1), layers 2-6; primary auditory cortex (A1), layers 2-6; primary visual cortex (V1), layers 2-6 including 4A, 4B, 4Calpha (4Ca), 4Cbeta (4Cb); secondary visual cortex (V2), layers 2-6; middle temporal area (MT), layers 2-6; temporal area (TE), layers 2-6; hippocampus, CA1, CA2, CA3, dentate gyrus (DG); and dorsal lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN), magnocellular, parvocellular and koniocellular divisions. Due to the limited number of samples that could be amplified concurrently, amplifications were performed in 3 batches (batches A-C, containing 102, 119 and 10 experimental samples, respectively). To control for batch effects, common RNA pool control samples were amplified and hybridized in each batch. These included LCM extracted hippocampus CA3 samples from the current study and a whole rhesus brain RNA pool (Biochain). These control samples were hybridized in 6 replicates in batch A and B and in 3 replicates in batch C (3 replicates per 96 well plate).
2012-03-21 | E-GEOD-31613 | biostudies-arrayexpress
Project description:Genome-wide transcriptional profiling allows characterization of the molecular underpinnings of neocortical organization, including cortical areal specialization, laminar cell type diversity and functional anatomy. Microarray analysis of individual cortical layers across sensorimotor and association cortices in rhesus macaque demonstrated robust and specific laminar and areal molecular signatures driven by differential expression of genes associated with specialized neuronal function. Gene expression corresponding with laminar architecture was generally similar across cortical areas, although genes with robust areal patterning were often highly laminar as well, and these patterns were more highly conserved between macaque and human as compared to mouse. Layer 4 of primate primary visual cortex displayed a distinct molecular signature compared to other cortical regions, a specialization not observed in mouse. Overall, transcriptome-based relationships were strongest between proximal layers in a cortical area, and between neighboring areas along the rostrocaudal axis, reflecting in vivo cortical spatial topography and therefore a developmental imprint.
2012-03-21 | GSE31613 | GEO
Project description:Enhancer elements control mammalian transcription largely in a cell-type-specific manner. The genome-wide identification of enhancer elements and their activity status in a cellular context is therefore fundamental to understanding cell identity and function. We determined enhancer activity in mouse embryonic stem (ES) cells using chromatin modifications and characterised their global properties. Specifically, we first grouped enhancers into 5 groups using multiple H3K4me1, H3K27ac, and H3K27me3 modification data sets. Active enhancers (simultaneous presence of H3K4me1 and H3K27ac) were enriched for binding of pluripotency factors and were found near pluripotency-related genes. Although both H3K4me1-only and active enhancers were enriched for super-enhancers and a TATA box like motif, active enhancers were preferentially bound by RNA polII (s2) and were enriched for bidirectional transcription, while H3K4me1-only enhancers were enriched for RNA polII (8WG16) suggesting they were likely poised. Bivalent enhancers (simultaneous presence of H3K4me1 and H3K27me3) were preferentially in the vicinity of bivalent genes. They were enriched for binding of components of polycomb complex as well as Tcf3 and Oct4. Moreover, a 'CTTTCTC' de-novo motif was enriched at bivalent enhancers, previously identified at bivalent promoters in ES cells. Taken together, 3 histone modifications successfully demarcated active, bivalent, and poised enhancers with distinct sequence and binding features.
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