E2f regulation of gene expression in the liver [1 mo]

E2Fs are regulators of the cell cycle and are involved in development. In this study we examine transcriptional changes occurring the liver in E2f1 (1KI) and E2f3b (3bKI) knock in mice. These mice have E2f1 or E2f3b knocked into the E2F3a locus resulting in loss of E2f3a and expression of E2f1 or E2f3b from the E2f3a locus as originally described In Tsai et. al., Nature 2008. Microarrays were used to evaluate transcriptional changes due to alterations in E2F expression during liver development. Affymetrix microarrays were performed using RNA samples from 4 weeks (1 month) old livers from wildtype (wt), E2F3a knockout (3aKO) E2f1 knock-in (1KI) and E2f3b knock-in (3bKI) mice.E2F家族蛋白（E2Fs）是细胞周期的调控因子，同时参与个体发育过程。本研究旨在探究E2f1（1KI）与E2f3b（3bKI）基因敲入小鼠肝脏内发生的转录变化。此类小鼠通过将E2f1或E2f3b敲入E2F3a基因座，实现E2F3a的表达缺失，并由E2F3a基因座驱动E2f1或E2f3b的转录，该构建策略最初由Tsai等人于2008年发表于《Nature》期刊。本研究采用基因芯片（microarray）技术，评估肝脏发育过程中E2F表达异常所引发的转录变化。实验采集4周龄（即1月龄）野生型（wt）、E2F3a基因敲除（3aKO）、E2f1基因敲入（1KI）及E2f3b基因敲入（3bKI）小鼠的肝脏RNA样本，开展Affymetrix基因芯片检测。