Fig. 2.
Utx regulates the levels of H3K27me3 in ES cells and the timely activation of key developmental regulators during differentiation. (A) Representative pictures of the mesoderm, endoderm, and ectoderm structures observed in ES cell derived teratomas. UtxKO/KO ES cell-derived teratomas contained a large number of giant trophoblast cells. Cartilage (C), Respiratory Epithelium (RE), neurons (N) and ciliated structure (Arrows) are indicated. (B) H&E staining of EBs harvested at day 10 postdifferentiation. Heterozygous female ES cells display structures indicative of differentiation in essentially all EBs in view. Female UTX-null ES cells do not. (C) Gene activation during embryoid body differentiation of male UTX-deficient (UtxKO) male, UTX-deficient (UtxKO/KO) female, and UTX-heterozygote (UtxKO/Wt) female ES cells. qRT-PCR was performed on RNA harvested from ES cells and EBs collected at day 10. Fold activation over GAPDH is represented for four genes representing the three germ layers: mesoderm (Gata4 and Gata6), endoderm (T), and ectoderm (Otx2). (D) H3K27me3 increases at developmental regulators in UTX-deficient ES cells. ChIP-seq density profiles for H3K27me3 and H3K4me3 in male Utx-null (UtxKO) ES cells and male ES cells with restored UTX expression (UtxFlx) are shown. The y axis floor is set at 0.5 reads per million. Gene models are shown below the density profiles.