Transcriptomic and epigenomic analyses explore the potential role of H3K4me3 in neomycin-induced cochlear Lgr5+ progenitor cell regeneration of hair cells.

Currently, adult cochlear hair cells (HCs) lack the capacity to regenerate, particularly the hearing damage caused by the HC damage are hard to recover. Remarkably, Lgr5+ inner ear progenitor cells can be activated to proliferate and regenerate hair cells (HCs) in response to injury, but the epigenetic regulatory roles in HC regeneration from Lgr5+ progenitor cells remain unresolved to date. We here investigate the possible roles of H3K4me3 modification in Lgr5+ progenitor cell proliferation and HC regeneration, and identify these differentially expressed genes associated with different binding regions between untreated Lgr5+ progenitor cells (ULPs) and neomycin-treated Lgr5+ progenitor cells (NLPs). Especially, H3K4me3 modification drives 12 genes involved in regulating proliferation and HC regeneration. Interestingly, we find that transcription factors Zeb1, Fev and Prdm5 are enriched in distinct peaks, implying their probable important roles in modulating neomycin-induced Lgr5+ progenitor cell proliferation and HC regeneration. Overall, our study demonstrates the underlying roles of H3k4me3 modification in Lgr5+ progenitor cell proliferation and HCs regeneration, and provides candidate H3K4me3 modification targets and regulators for subsequent studies.