| First Author | Cheng CY | Year | 2013 |
| Journal | PLoS One | Volume | 8 |
| Issue | 4 | Pages | e60905 |
| PubMed ID | 23630575 | Mgi Jnum | J:200568 |
| Mgi Id | MGI:5508862 | Doi | 10.1371/journal.pone.0060905 |
| Citation | Cheng CY, et al. (2013) Detection and organ-specific ablation of neuroendocrine cells by synaptophysin locus-based BAC cassette in transgenic mice. PLoS One 8(4):e60905 |
| abstractText | The role of cells of the diffuse neuroendocrine system in development and maintenance of individual organs and tissues remains poorly understood. Here we identify a regulatory region sufficient for accurate in vivo expression of synaptophysin (SYP), a common marker of neuroendocrine differentiation, and report generation of Tg(Syp-EGFP(loxP)-DTA)147(Ayn) (SypELDTA) mice suitable for flexible organ-specific ablation of neuroendocrine cells. These mice express EGFP and diphtheria toxin fragment A (DTA) in SYP positive cells before and after Cre-loxP mediated recombination, respectively. As a proof of principle, we have crossed SypELDTA mice with EIIA-Cre and PB-Cre4 mice. EIIA-Cre mice express Cre recombinase in a broad range of tissues, while PB-Cre4 mice specifically express Cre recombinase in the prostate epithelium. Double transgenic EIIA-Cre; SypELDTA embryos exhibited massive cell death in SYP positive cells. At the same time, PB-Cre4; SypELDTA mice showed a substantial decrease in the number of neuroendocrine cells and associated prostate hypotrophy. As no increase in cell death and/or Cre-loxP mediated recombination was observed in non-neuroendocrine epithelium cells, these results suggest that neuroendocrine cells play an important role in prostate development. High cell type specificity of Syp locus-based cassette and versatility of generated mouse model should assure applicability of these resources to studies of neuroendocrine cell functions in various tissues and organs. |
