Research Progress

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  CRISPR Bacon: Chinese Scientists Create Genetically Modified Low-Fat Pigs

  In a paper published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the scientists report that they have created 12 healthy pigs with about 24 percent less body fat than normal pigs.The scientists created low-fat pigs in the hopes of providing pig farmers with animals that would be less expensive to raise and would suffer less in cold weather.

  Oct 24, 2017
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  Rat embryonic stem cells produce fertile offspring through tetraploid complementation

  Pluripotent stem cells, including embryonic stem cells (ESCs) and induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), which have the capacity to generate any type of cells of the body, have been broadly applied in studying developmental biology, genome engineering, and regenerative medicine.

  Oct 24, 2017
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  SUN5 anchors sperm head to the tail

  Spermatozoa are the essential carriers of the paternal genetic materials to achieve sexual reproduction, so their morphology, motility and integrity are critical to male fertility. Teratozoospermia is resulted from the failures in morphogenesis of sperms, and substantially lead to male infertility. The acephalic spermatozoa syndrome is considered as the most severe subtype of teratozoospermia, since the sperms contain no nucleus in the head and are unable to fertilize the oocytes. The syndrome has been documented for decades and troubles patients till today, but little is known about its etiology.

  Oct 23, 2017
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  Pig mutants aid to decipher the novel mechanism underlying the thyroid hormone deficiency associated anemia and immunodeficiency

  Congenital hypothyroidism (CH) is caused by thyroid hormone (TH) deficiencies. CH is one of the most prevalent endocrine diseases, occurring in 1 of 1400 to 2800 newborns. Based on anemia often being the first sign of hypothyroidism, accounting for 20% to 60% in hypothyroid patients, the current clinical guidelines recommend evaluating thyroid function in the workup of anemia.

  Oct 23, 2017
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  Subcortical Maternal Complex: a Functional Module in the Mammalian Oocyte-to-zygote Transition

  Human reproductive disorders affect people all over the world, bringing both personal sufferings and heavy social burdens. The advanced assisted reproductive technologies (ART) have helped the couples successfully conceive their babies; however, reproductive wastage frequently occurs even in early stage of embryogenesis with unexplained reasons.

  Oct 10, 2017
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  Epigenetic regulation of left-right asymmetry by DNA methylation

  DNA methylation is one of the major epigenetic modifications in vertebrates, which involves adding a methyl group to the 5th carbon of cytosine to form 5-methylcytosine (5mC), which is established and maintained by DNA methyltransferases (DNMT).

  Sep 12, 2017
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  Nature: m6A modulates hematopoietic stem and progenitor cell specification

  Hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) are the only cells which have the capability to self-renew and differentiate into all blood lineages. The limit of the donors to provide sufficient HSCs in the clinic makes it urgent to produce HSCs ex vivo or in vitro in regenerative medicine

  Sep 07, 2017
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  Establishment of haploid somatic cell-based genetic screening system

  Haploid cells have only one set of chromosomes, and therefore are a valuable tool in genetic screening and transgenic animal production. In previous studies, mammalian haploid embryonic stem cells have been established. However, since haploid embryonic stem cells undergo spontaneous diploidization during culture and differentiation, there are challenges in establishing haploid somatic cells and somatic cell-based genetic screening system.

  Aug 30, 2017
• Mettl3-mediated m6A regulates spermatogonial differentiation and meiosis initiation

  Aug 24, 2017
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  A new mechanism of hematopoietic stem cell expansion identified

  The allusion of mencius’ mother moving three time tells us that a proper environment is particularly important for children’s growing up. In the case of hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells (HSPCs), the microenvironment is dynamic in vivo during HSPC development.

  Aug 11, 2017