The biochemical and biophysical basis for the enhanced reprogramming activity of an artificially enhanced Pit-Oct-Unc transcription factor - ePOU

This is the data set used for the MPhil thesis of the same title. Background: Cellular reprogramming has the potential to revolutionize medicine through personalized disease models, ex vivo drug testing and regenerative therapies. Our group engineered the scaffold of Pit-Oct-Unc (POU) factor in the context of iPSC reprogramming and identified an enhanced POU factor (ePOU) that substantially outperforms wild-type Oct4 in terms of speed and efficiency. However, the mechanism behind its enhanced ability is unknown. Here, I try to understand reprogramming through comparing and contrasting ePOU with Oct4 through biochemical and biophysical means.