Hao Jian-Xiu, Meng Tie-Gang, Fan Li-Hua, Yao Yuan-Qing
Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, General Hospital of Chinese People's Liberation Army, Beijing, China.
State Key Laboratory of Stem Cell and Reproductive Biology, Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.
PLoS One. 2017 May 18;12(5):e0177202. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0177202. eCollection 2017.
Oocyte maturation, the important process to produce female haploid gamete, accompanies with polarity establishment and highly asymmetric cell division to emit minor polar body within little cytoplasm. Microfilaments play central roles in polarity establishment and asymmetric cell division. Several actin regulators like WASP protein family as well as small GTPases function in microfilament dynamics, involving the process. Rac1, one member of RhoGTPases, has been reported to regulate the polarity and asymmetric cell division in mouse oocytes in vitro. The physiological role of Rac1 in mouse oocyte remains unknown. By conditional knockout technology, we specifically deleted Rac1 gene in mouse oocyte, and found that Rac1 deletion exerted little effect on mouse oocyte maturation including polarity establishment and asymmetric division, and the mutant mice showed normal fertility.
卵母细胞成熟是产生雌性单倍体配子的重要过程,伴随着极性建立和高度不对称的细胞分裂,以在极少的细胞质中排出小极体。微丝在极性建立和不对称细胞分裂中起核心作用。几种肌动蛋白调节因子,如WASP蛋白家族以及小GTP酶,在微丝动力学中发挥作用,参与这一过程。Rac1是RhoGTP酶的成员之一,据报道在体外调节小鼠卵母细胞的极性和不对称细胞分裂。Rac1在小鼠卵母细胞中的生理作用仍然未知。通过条件性基因敲除技术,我们在小鼠卵母细胞中特异性删除了Rac1基因,发现Rac1缺失对小鼠卵母细胞成熟(包括极性建立和不对称分裂)影响很小,并且突变小鼠表现出正常的生育能力。