Vol41 No.3: 231-236

MicroRNA expression profiling during neural differentiation of mouse embryonic carcinoma P19 cells

Bing Huang¹, Wei Li¹, Botao Zhao¹, Caihong Xia², Ruqiang Liang¹, Kangcheng Ruan¹, Naihe Jing², and Youxin Jin^1*

(1 State Key Laboratory of Molecular Biology; 2 Key Laboratory of Molecular Cell Biology, Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Shanghai Institute for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, People��s Republic of China)

Abstract
����MicroRNAs (or miRNAs) are small non-coding RNAs (21�C25 nucleotides) that are involved in a wide range of activities related to the development and differentiation of cells. Comparison of the miRNA expression profiles of mouse P19 embryonic carcinoma cells with those of differentiated neural stem cells showed that the expression level of 65 miRNAs changed (2-fold) after differentiation. MiR-124a was dramatically upregulated (more than 20-fold) while miRNAs of the miR-302 family and those in the miR-290�C295 cluster were strongly down-regulated. Further analysis revealed that some important factors such as Oct4 and Sox2 appeared to be involved in the regulation of these miRNAs. These results may contribute to a better understanding of miRNA-regulated neural differentiation in early mouse embryos.

Received: 2008-10-7����Accepted: 2008-11-28

*Corresponding author . Tel: +86-21-54921222; Fax: +86-21-54921011; E-mail: [email protected]

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