Abstract:

BACKGROUND: Polycomb group member nervous system polycomb 1 (NSPc1) is a transcription repressor which is highly expressed in the embryo nervous system. Recent research has shown that NSPc1 should be a new regulator of neural stem cell as well as its homologue Bmi1.
OBJECTIVE: To identify the whole genome binding sites of stem cell regulator NSPc1 in the P19 neural differentiation model (mouse embryonal carcinoma cells).
METHODS: Ex vivo expanded undifferentiated P19 cells, which have high expression of endogenous NSPc1 gene, were applied to chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) analysis by using rabbit anti-NSPc1 polyclonal antibody. ChIP-on-chip, a high throughput method of screening the binding targets of NSPc1, was used within these P19 cells. Finally, the functional features of targets were analyzed with bio-informatics methods.
RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: Nearly 1 280 NSPc1 target genes were screened out. Gene Ontology terms associated with "differentiation, development, transcription and its regulation, neurogenesis" were of significantly higher frequency with NSPc1 target genes than their random frequency across the entire genome. Whole genome binding sites analysis is able to indicate the target gene profile of NSPc1 in P19 neural differentiation model, which is very helpful to further investigate the downstream signaling pathway of the new stem cell regulator NSPc1.