Cell Cycle Length Determination of Serum-grown Mouse Embryonic Stem Cells

The goal of this experiment was to determine the length of the cell cycle in mouse embryonic stem cells using a block and release experiment. Cells were treated with CDK1 inhibitor RO-3306 for 15 hours then released, harvested every 2 hours, and stained with propidium iodide for quantification of timing spent in each cell cycle phase.
Conclusion:
Quantification of the percentage of cells in each phase of the cell cycle show that the mouse embryonic stem cells used for this experiment take approximately 10 hours to progress through a full cell cycle. The cells spend 2 to 4 hours to proceed through the G1 phase, which the authors propose to be a critical phase for heterochromatin maintenance. Flow cytometry was performed on duplicates of all samples: untreated and 0-16 hours post-release from RO-3306 treatment, with samples taken every 2 hours post-release.