Comparative study on the expression characteristics of transgenes inserted into the Gt(ROSA)26Sor and H11 loci in mice.

The Gt(ROSA)26Sor ( ROSA26) and H11 loci are commonly used as safe harbors for the construction of targeted transgenic mice. However, it remains unclear whether these two loci have distinct effects on transgene expression. In this study, we insert three differently colored fluorescent protein expression cassettes (EGFP, tdTomato and mTagBFP2) driven by the CAG promoter into the ROSA26 and H11 loci. We generate five single-transgenic mouse models and a triple-transgenic mouse model expressing three distinct fluorescent proteins simultaneously. Our results reveal that the efficiency of transgene expression is greater at the ROSA26 locus with a reverse orientation relative to the transcription of the ROSA26 gene. In most tissues examined, the efficiency of transgene expression at the ROSA26 locus exceeds that at the H11 locus. Moreover, the expression profiles of identical transgenes display discrepancies across various tissues, and notably, substantial heterogeneity in transgene expression is discernible within cells of the same tissue. Our findings offer a valuable reference for the selection of safe harbors and strategies for the construction of transgenic mouse models.

Dissecting the PRSS37 interactome and potential mechanisms leading to ADAM3 loss in PRSS37-null sperm.

A disintegrin and metalloproteinase 3 (ADAM3) is a sperm membrane protein critical for sperm migration from the uterus into the oviduct and sperm-egg binding in mice. Disruption of PRSS37 results in male infertility concurrent with the absence of mature ADAM3 from cauda epididymal sperm. However, how PRSS37 modulates ADAM3 maturation remains largely unclear. Here, we determine the PRSS37 interactome by GFP immunoprecipitation coupled with mass spectrometry in PRSS37-EGFP knock-in mice. Three molecular chaperones (CLGN, CALR3 and PDILT) and three ADAM proteins (ADAM2, ADAM6B and ADAM4) were identified to be interacting with PRSS37. Coincidently, five of them (except ADAM4) have been reported to interact with ADAM3 precursor and regulate its maturation. We further demonstrated that PRSS37 also interacts directly with ADAM3 precursor and its deficiency impedes the association between PDILT and ADAM3. This could contribute to improper translocation of ADAM3 to the germ cell surface, leading to ADAM3 loss in PRSS37-null mature sperm. The understanding of the maturation mechanisms of pivotal sperm plasma membrane proteins will pave the way toward novel strategies for contraception and the treatment of unexplained male infertility.

Establishment, characterization, and application of pAcr-SP-NTP-EGFP transgenic mice in visualizing the oviduct-migrating ability of sperm from Prss37-null mice.

Transgenic mouse model with fluorescently labeled sperm has extensive application value. It is an auxiliary tool for investigating the mechanism of fertilization, especially for visualizing the oviduct-migrating ability of sperm in vivo. Here, we produced transgenic mouse lines whose sperm were tagged with enhanced green fluorescent protein (EGFP) according to the previously described method. Polymerase chain reaction analysis of tail-tip genomic DNA identified 13 founders, of which 5 male founders produced offspring to form transgenic lines. We showed that EGFP was testis-specifically expressed, sharing similar expression pattern with endogenous acrosin. It has luminal side restricted distribution in seminiferous tubules and acrosomal aggregation in mature sperm. In addition, interstrain hybridization obtained Prss37(-/-)EGFP(tg/+) males produced sperm with impaired oviduct-migrating ability as visualized under fluorescence microscope, compared with Prss37(+/+)EGFP(tg/+) counterparts. These results indicate that a transgenic mouse model with fluorescently labeled sperm has been successfully established and it is a useful tool for evaluating the oviduct-migrating ability of sperm.

Increased Anxiety-like Behaviors in Adgra1-/- Male But Not Female Mice are Attributable to Elevated Neuron Dendrite Density, Upregulated PSD95 Expression, and Abnormal Activation of the PI3K/AKT/GSK-3ß and MEK/ERK Pathways.

Adhesion G protein-coupled receptor A1 (ADGRA1) belongs to the G protein-coupled receptor (GPCR) family, and its physiological function remains largely unknown. We found that Adgra1 is highly and exclusively expressed in the brain, suggesting that Adgra1 may be involved in the regulation of neurological behaviors including anxiety, depression, learning and memory. To this end, we comprehensively analyzed the potential role of ADGRA1 in the neurobehaviors of mice by comparing Adgra1-/- and their wild-type (wt) littermates. We found that Adgra1-/- male but not female mice exhibited elevated anxiety levels in the open field, elevated plus maze, and light-dark box tests, with normal depression levels in the tail-suspension and forced-swim tests, and comparable learning and memory abilities in the Morris water maze, Y maze, fear condition, and step-down avoidance tests. Further studies showed that ADGRA1 deficiency resulted in higher dendritic branching complexity and spine density as evidenced by elevated expression levels of SYN and PSD95 in amygdalae of male mice. Finally, we found that PI3K/AKT/GSK-3ß and MEK/ERK in amygdalae of Adgra1-deficient male mice were aberrantly activated when compared to wt male mice. Together, our findings reveal an important suppressive role of ADGRA1 in anxiety control and synaptic function by regulating the PI3K/AKT/GSK-3ß and MEK/ERK pathways in amygdalae of male mice, implicating a potential, therapeutic application in novel anti-anxiety drug development.

miR-29a/b1 Regulates the Luteinizing Hormone Secretion and Affects Mouse Ovulation.

miR-29a/b1 was reportedly involved in the regulation of the reproductive function in female mice, but the underlying molecular mechanisms are not clear. In this study, female mice lacking miR-29a/b1 showed a delay in vaginal opening, irregular estrous cycles, ovulation disorder and subfertility. The level of luteinizing hormone (LH) was significantly lower in plasma but higher in pituitary of mutant mice. However, egg development was normal in mutant mice and the ovulation disorder could be rescued by the superovulation treatment. These results suggested that the LH secretion was impaired in mutant mice. Further studies showed that deficiency of miR-29a/b1 in mice resulted in an abnormal expression of a number of proteins involved in vesicular transport and exocytosis in the pituitary, indicating the mutant mice had insufficient LH secretion. However, the detailed mechanism needs more research.

ADGRA1 negatively regulates energy expenditure and thermogenesis through both sympathetic nervous system and hypothalamus-pituitary-thyroid axis in male mice.

Adhesion G protein-coupled receptor A1 (ADGRA1, also known as GPR123) belongs to the G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) family and is well conserved in the vertebrate lineage. However, the structure of ADGRA1 is unique and its physiological function remains unknown. Previous studies have shown that Adgra1 is predominantly expressed in the central nervous system (CNS), indicating its important role in the transduction of neural signals. The aim of this study is to investigate the central function of Adgra1 in vivo and clarify its physiological significance by establishing an Adgra1-deficient mouse (Adgra1-/-) model. The results show that Adgra1-/- male mice exhibit decreased body weight with normal food intake and locomotion, shrinkage of body mass, increased lipolysis, and hypermetabolic activity. Meanwhile, mutant male mice present elevated core temperature coupled with resistance to hypothermia upon cold stimulus. Further studies show that tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) and ß3-adrenergic receptor (ß3-AR), indicators of sympathetic nerve excitability, are activated as well as their downstream molecules including uncoupling protein 1 (UCP1), coactivator 1 alpha (PGC1-α) in brown adipose tissue (BAT), and hormone-sensitive lipase (HSL) in white adipose tissue (WAT). In addition, mutant male mice have higher levels of serum T3, T4, accompanied by increased mRNAs of hypothalamus-pituitary-thyroid axis. Finally, Adgra1-/- male mice present abnormal activation of PI3K/AKT/GSK3ß and MEK/ERK pathways in hypothalamus. Overexpression of ADGRA1 in Neuro2A cell line appears to suppress these two signaling pathways. In contrast, Adgra1-/- female mice show comparable body weight along with normal metabolic process to their sex-matched controls. Collectively, ADGRA1 is a negative regulator of sympathetic nervous system (SNS) and hypothalamus-pituitary-thyroid axis by regulating PI3K/AKT/GSK3ß and MEK/ERK pathways in hypothalamus of male mice, suggesting an important role of ADGRA1 in maintaining metabolic homeostasis including energy expenditure and thermogenic balance.

Excision of selectable genes from transgenic goat cells by a protein transducible TAT-Cre recombinase.

The Cre/loxP site-specific recombination system is a widely used tool for genetic engineering of mammalian genomes. Recombination of loxP-modified alleles is often induced by introduction of foreign DNA vector expressing Cre into the cells. But the introduced DNA vector has the potential to integrate into the genome of the cells and continuous expression of Cre recombinase from the foreign vector has the potential to yield cytotoxicity and genotoxicity in various cells. In this study, we investigate the possibility of overcoming this limitation by using a cell-permeable TAT-Cre recombinase. We found that TAT-Cre treatment of transgenic goat fibroblast cells did not compromise the development competency of reconstructed embryos by using these TAT-Cre-treated cells as nuclear donor in nuclear transfer. Finally, we obtained two live cloned goats where a selectable gene cassette was removed. Our work not only provided an efficient protein transduction-based system for removing selectable genes from transgenic goats, but also presented strong evidence that no severe damage was made to the host cells during the process of protein transduction.

Production of Prnp-/- goats by gene targeting in adult fibroblasts.

Homozygous mice devoid of functional Prnp are resistant to scrapie and prion propagation, but heterozygous mice for Prnp disruption still suffer from prion disease and prion deposition. We have previously generated heterozygous cloned goats with one allele of Prnp functional disruption. To obtain goats with both alleles of Prnp be disrupted which would be resistant to scrapie completely, a second-round gene targeting was applied to disrupt the wild type allele of Prnp in the heterozygous goats. By second-round gene targeting, we successfully disrupted the wild type allele of Prnp in primary Prnp (+/-) goat skin fibroblasts and obtained a Prnp (-/-) cell line without Prnp expression. This is the first report on successful targeting modification in primary adult somatic cells of animals. These cells were used as nuclear donors for somatic cell cloning to produce Prnp (-/-) goats. A total of 57 morulae or blastocytes developed from the reconstructed embryos were transferred to 31 recipients, which produced 7 pregnancies at day 35. At 73 days of gestation, we obtained one cloned fetus with Prnp (-/-) genotype. Our research not only indicated that multiple genetic modifications could be accomplished by multi-round gene targeting in primary somatic cells, but also provided strong evidence that gene targeting in adult cells other than fetal cells could be applied to introduce precise genetic modifications in animals without destroying the embryos.

Goat MII ooplasts support preimplantation development of embryos cloned from other species.

The preimplantation development competences of somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT) embryos reconstructed with enuleated goat (Capra hircus) Metaphase II (MII) oocytes matured in vivo and whole cells derived from adult fibroblasts of several mammalian species (goat, boer goat, bovine, tahr, panda) and human patient were evaluated. Results obtained from our experiments revealed that these reconstructed SCNT embryos could complete preimplantation development to form blastocysts. The fusion rate and blastocyst rate of intra-species SCNT embryos (Capra hircus as control) was 78.67 (557/708); 56.29% (264/469), that of sub-species or inter-species SCNT embryos were: boer goat 78.18% (541/692); 33.90% (40/118), bovine 70.53% (146/207); 22.52% (25/111), tahr 53.51% (61/114); 5.26% (3/570), panda 79.82% (1159/1452); 8.35% (75/898) and human 68.76% (317/461); 5.41% (16/296), respectively. It is concluded that (1) there are no relationships between fusion rate and relativeness of the recipient cytoplasm to nucleus donor cells, (2) cytoplast of the goat MII oocyte can support the preimplantation development of SCNT embryos reconstructed with nucleus from other species, (3) the blastocyst rate of close relative inter-species SCNT embryos is higher than that of distant relative inter-species SCNT embryos.

Expression of active recombinant human lactoferrin in the milk of transgenic goats.

This report details the establishment of a transgenic goat model in order to produce human lactoferrin (hLf) in the mammary gland for large-scale application and research. Two transgenic male goats were generated by microinjecting sequence encoding hLf cDNA to the pronuclear. In the two lines, derived from the two founders, eight lactating female goats could secrete recombinant human lactoferrin (rhLf) at concentrations of up to 0.765 mg/ml. The method of purifying the rhLf from the milk was achieved using ion-exchange chromatography and resulted in 97% purity. Biochemical and physicochemical characteristics of rhLf were similar to native lactoferrin (nhLf); this included N-terminal sequence, isoelectric point, molecular mass, glycosylation, iron-binding/releasing ability, thermal stability, and proteolysis. The rhLf showed broad spectrum antibacterial activity inhibiting the growth of several pathogenic bacterial strains. Also investigated, although to a lesser degree, was a practicable pasteurization method for the downstream processing of rhLf and, further, a method for the oral administration of rhLf. On the basis of these results, our studies show an optimistic and promising approach for the large-scale production and therapeutic application of rhLf expressed in transgenic goats.

Factors derived from mouse embryonic stem cells promote self-renewal of goat embryonic stem-like cells.

Goat embryonic stem (ES)-like cells could be isolated from primary materials-inner cell masses (ICMs) and remain undifferentiated for eight passages in a new culture system containing mouse ES cell conditioned medium (ESCCM) and on a feeder layer of mouse embryo fibroblasts (MEFs). However, when cultured in medium without mouse ESCCM, goat ES-like cells could not survive for more than three passages. In addition, no ES-like cells could be obtained when ICMs were cultured on goat embryo fibroblasts or the primary materials-whole goat blastocysts were cultured on MEFs. Goat ES-like cells isolated from ICMs had a normal karyotype and highly expressed alkaline phosphatase. Multiple differentiation potency of the ES-like cells was confirmed by differentiation into neural cells and fibroblast-like cells in vitro. These results suggest that mouse ES cells might secrete factors playing important roles in promoting goat ES-like cells' self-renewal, moreover, the feeder layers and primary materials could also influence the successful isolation of goat ES-like cells.