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Epigenetic regulation of lateralized fetal spinal gene expression underlies hemispheric asymmetries
Lateralization is a fundamental principle of nervous system organization but its molecular determinants are mostly unknown. In humans, asymmetric gene expression in the fetal cortex has been suggested as the molecular basis of handedness. However, human fetuses already show considerable asymmetries...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
eLife Sciences Publications, Ltd
2017
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5295814/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28145864 http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.22784 |
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author | Ocklenburg, Sebastian Schmitz, Judith Moinfar, Zahra Moser, Dirk Klose, Rena Lor, Stephanie Kunz, Georg Tegenthoff, Martin Faustmann, Pedro Francks, Clyde Epplen, Jörg T Kumsta, Robert Güntürkün, Onur |
author_facet | Ocklenburg, Sebastian Schmitz, Judith Moinfar, Zahra Moser, Dirk Klose, Rena Lor, Stephanie Kunz, Georg Tegenthoff, Martin Faustmann, Pedro Francks, Clyde Epplen, Jörg T Kumsta, Robert Güntürkün, Onur |
author_sort | Ocklenburg, Sebastian |
collection | PubMed |
description | Lateralization is a fundamental principle of nervous system organization but its molecular determinants are mostly unknown. In humans, asymmetric gene expression in the fetal cortex has been suggested as the molecular basis of handedness. However, human fetuses already show considerable asymmetries in arm movements before the motor cortex is functionally linked to the spinal cord, making it more likely that spinal gene expression asymmetries form the molecular basis of handedness. We analyzed genome-wide mRNA expression and DNA methylation in cervical and anterior thoracal spinal cord segments of five human fetuses and show development-dependent gene expression asymmetries. These gene expression asymmetries were epigenetically regulated by miRNA expression asymmetries in the TGF-β signaling pathway and lateralized methylation of CpG islands. Our findings suggest that molecular mechanisms for epigenetic regulation within the spinal cord constitute the starting point for handedness, implying a fundamental shift in our understanding of the ontogenesis of hemispheric asymmetries in humans. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.22784.001 |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-5295814 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2017 |
publisher | eLife Sciences Publications, Ltd |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-52958142017-02-10 Epigenetic regulation of lateralized fetal spinal gene expression underlies hemispheric asymmetries Ocklenburg, Sebastian Schmitz, Judith Moinfar, Zahra Moser, Dirk Klose, Rena Lor, Stephanie Kunz, Georg Tegenthoff, Martin Faustmann, Pedro Francks, Clyde Epplen, Jörg T Kumsta, Robert Güntürkün, Onur eLife Neuroscience Lateralization is a fundamental principle of nervous system organization but its molecular determinants are mostly unknown. In humans, asymmetric gene expression in the fetal cortex has been suggested as the molecular basis of handedness. However, human fetuses already show considerable asymmetries in arm movements before the motor cortex is functionally linked to the spinal cord, making it more likely that spinal gene expression asymmetries form the molecular basis of handedness. We analyzed genome-wide mRNA expression and DNA methylation in cervical and anterior thoracal spinal cord segments of five human fetuses and show development-dependent gene expression asymmetries. These gene expression asymmetries were epigenetically regulated by miRNA expression asymmetries in the TGF-β signaling pathway and lateralized methylation of CpG islands. Our findings suggest that molecular mechanisms for epigenetic regulation within the spinal cord constitute the starting point for handedness, implying a fundamental shift in our understanding of the ontogenesis of hemispheric asymmetries in humans. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.22784.001 eLife Sciences Publications, Ltd 2017-02-01 /pmc/articles/PMC5295814/ /pubmed/28145864 http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.22784 Text en © 2017, Ocklenburg et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited. |
spellingShingle | Neuroscience Ocklenburg, Sebastian Schmitz, Judith Moinfar, Zahra Moser, Dirk Klose, Rena Lor, Stephanie Kunz, Georg Tegenthoff, Martin Faustmann, Pedro Francks, Clyde Epplen, Jörg T Kumsta, Robert Güntürkün, Onur Epigenetic regulation of lateralized fetal spinal gene expression underlies hemispheric asymmetries |
title | Epigenetic regulation of lateralized fetal spinal gene expression underlies hemispheric asymmetries |
title_full | Epigenetic regulation of lateralized fetal spinal gene expression underlies hemispheric asymmetries |
title_fullStr | Epigenetic regulation of lateralized fetal spinal gene expression underlies hemispheric asymmetries |
title_full_unstemmed | Epigenetic regulation of lateralized fetal spinal gene expression underlies hemispheric asymmetries |
title_short | Epigenetic regulation of lateralized fetal spinal gene expression underlies hemispheric asymmetries |
title_sort | epigenetic regulation of lateralized fetal spinal gene expression underlies hemispheric asymmetries |
topic | Neuroscience |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5295814/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28145864 http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.22784 |
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