HOME HELP FEEDBACK SUBSCRIPTIONS ARCHIVE SEARCH TABLE OF CONTENTS		QUICK SEARCH:   [advanced] Author: Keyword(s): Year:  Vol:  Page:

This Article Full Text Full Text (PDF) All Versions of this Article: 79/6/1014    most recent biolreprod.108.070409v1 Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Citation Map Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal My Folders Download to citation manager Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Sun, Q.-Y. Articles by Kikuchi, K. Search for Related Content PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by Sun, Q.-Y. Articles by Kikuchi, K. Agricola Articles by Sun, Q.-Y. Articles by Kikuchi, K.

Oocyte-Specific Knockout: A Novel In Vivo Approach for Studying Gene Functions During Folliculogenesis, Oocyte Maturation, Fertilization, and Embryogenesis¹

State Key Laboratory of Reproductive Biology,³ Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100080, China Division of Animal Sciences,⁴ National Institute of Agrobiological Sciences, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8602, Japan Department of Medical Biochemistry and Biophysics,⁵ Umeå University, SE-901 87 Umeå, Sweden

ABSTRACT

Knockout mice have been highly useful tools in helping to understand the functional roles of specific genes in development and diseases. However, in many cases, knockout mice are embryonic lethal, which prevents investigation into a number of important questions, or they display developmental abnormalities, including fertility defects. In contrast, conditional knockout, which is achieved by the Cre-LoxP system, can be used to delete a gene in a specific organ or tissue, or at a specific developmental stage. This technique has advantages over conventional knockout, especially when conventional knockout causes embryonic lethality or when the function of maternal transcripts in early development needs to be defined. Recently, a widely used practice has been used to specifically delete genes of interest in oocytes: Zp3-Cre or Gdf9-Cre transgenic mouse lines, in which Cre-recombinase expression is driven by oocyte-specific zona pellucida 3 (Zp3) promoter or growth differentiation factor 9 (Gdf9) promoter, are crossed with mice bearing floxed target genes. This novel in vivo approach has helped to increase the understanding of the functions of specific genes in folliculogenesis/oogenesis, oocyte maturation, fertilization, and embryogenesis. In this minireview we discuss recent advances in understanding the molecular mechanisms regulating major reproductive and developmental events as revealed by oocyte-specific conditional knockout and perspectives on this technology and related studies.

conditional knockout, Cre-recombinase, embryo, embryogenesis, fertilization, follicular development, folliculogenesis, gamete biology, meiosis, oocyte

¹This work was completed when Q.-Y.S. worked in Kazuhiro Kikuchi's laboratory supported by an Invitation Fellowship for Research from the Japanese Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS-S08127). Q.-Y.S. is currently supported by the National Basic Research Program of China (2006CB944001 and 2006CB504004).

Correspondence: ²Kazuhiro Kikuchi, Division of Animal Sciences, National Institute of Agrobiological Sciences, Kannondai 2-1-2, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8602, Japan. FAX: 81 298 38 7447; e-mail: kiku{at}affrc.go.jp