Citation:
Development. 2019;[Epub ahead of print] doi:10.1242/dev.171017
Abstract:
miR-203 is a tumor-suppressor microRNA with known functions in cancer metastasis. Here, we explore its normal developmental role in the context of neural crest development. During the epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition of neural crest cells to emigrate from the neural tube, miR-203 displays a reciprocal expression pattern with key regulators of neural crest delamination, Phf12 and Snail2, and interacts with their 3'UTRs. We show that ectopic maintenance of miR-203 inhibits neural crest migration, whereas its functional inhibition using a “sponge” vector or morpholinos promotes premature neural crest delamination. Bisulfite sequencing further shows that epigenetic repression of miR-203 is mediated by the de novo DNA methyltransferase DNMT3B, whose recruitment to regulatory regions on the miR-203 locus is directed by SNAIL2 in a negative feedback loop. These findings reveal an important role for miR-203 in an epigenetic-microRNA regulatory network that influences the timing of neural crest delamination.
Epub:
Yes
Link to Publication:
http://dev.biologists.org/content/early/2019/03/21/dev.171017
Organism or Cell Type:
Gallus gallus (chick)