development of a new technology to detect epigenetic asymmetry between sister chromatids prior to cell division

2020 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 19K22392
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Research (Exploratory)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Review Section: Medium-sized Section 43:Biology at molecular to cellular levels, and related fields
• Research Institution: Osaka University
• Principal Investigator: Nagano Takashi 大阪大学, 蛋白質研究所, 招へい教授 (70272854)
• Project Period (FY): 2019-06-28 – 2021-03-31
• Keywords: 非対称細胞分裂 / 染色分体 / エピジェネティクス

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Diverse types of cells in multicellular organism share almost identical genome, but the epigenomic information specific to each cell type plays crucial roles for the cellular diversity. It is an important question whether a new epigenome information is set before or after the cell division in which the corresponding new cell type is born. However, the question has been unanswered because there has been no appropriate method to find the answer. More specifically, there has been no way to discriminate a pair of sister chromatids carrying epigenetic information because they have exactly the same DNA sequence, and the purpose of this research is to develop a new method to discriminate between sister chromatids. Although we have not completed the technology development, we have found an efficient way to label sister chromatids differently and discriminate between them.

Free Research Field

エピゲノミクス

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

１個の受精卵からスタートした私達の細胞はエピゲノム情報を頼りに人体を作り上げ、疾患や老化などにおいてもエピゲノム情報の異常が関わっていることが分かっている。従って、細胞が増える際にエピゲノム情報が適切に継承されるメカニズムを知ることには大きな意義がある。特に新たな種類の細胞が生まれる際にはそれに対応する新たなエピゲノム情報が必要なので、それがどのように作られるのかはとりわけ重要である。本研究の成果は、そのメカニズムを調べるための新たな技術に必要な知識であり、今後の研究の礎となるものである。