Activation of endogenous genes by CRISPR enables conversion of mouse fibroblasts into cardiac progenitor cells

In this study, we determine whether direct activation of endogenous loci by targeting the genomic DNA (using a CRISPRa system) can fulfill reprogramming of fibroblasts into cardiac progenitors. Core promoter regions of Gata4, Nkx2-5, and Tbx5 were targeted by the CRISPRa (Synergistic Activation Mediator). RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) was performed to characterize the transcriptome of the transfected fibroblasts (TTFs) and reprogrammed cells. These data indicate that our CRISPRa approaches can induce cardiac reprogramming and establish a gene network for heart development.