Increased FGF8 Signaling Promotes Chondrogenic Rather Than Osteogenic Development in the Embryonic Skull

RNA-seq of RNA isolated from E14.5 mouse embryos- wildtype cranial base tissue, Msx2-Cre;CAGFgf8 mutant cranial vault, and wildtype cranial vault; 3 replicates of each group. E14.5 embryos, generated from an Msx2-Cre x CAGF8 cross, were dissected in ice-cold PBS. From the mutant and control embryos, the skin was peeled away from the skull and the underlying cranial vault tissue was collected. Subsequently, for the control embryos, the brain was removed and the cartilaginous sections of the cranial base were carefully collected as well. All tissues from the mutant (cranial vault) and control embryos (cranial vault and cartilaginous cranial base) were stored in RNAlater (Ambion/Life Technologies) until RNA extraction. RNA was extracted from 9 mutant and control cranial vaults as well as 9 cranial bases using RNeasy Lipid Tissue Mini Kit (Qiagen Cat. NO 74804) following the manufacturer’s protocol. Within each group, the 9 samples were pooled into three groups, with 3 samples making up each group, so that the RNA concentrations were similar.