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This article has been retracted

Science 17 February 2006:
Vol. 311. no. 5763, pp. 992 - 996
DOI: 10.1126/science.1120925
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Reports

Cdx2 Gene Expression and Trophectoderm Lineage Specification in Mouse Embryos

Kaushik Deb,1 Mayandi Sivaguru,2 Hwan Yul Yong,1 R. Michael Roberts1,3*

Controversy exists as to whether individual blastomeres from two-cell-stage mouse embryos have identical developmental properties and fate. We show that the transcription factor Cdx2 is expressed in the nuclei of cells derived from the late-dividing but not the first-dividing blastomere of two-cell embryos and, by lineage tracing and RNA interference knock-down experiments, that this lagging cell is the precursor of trophectoderm. Cdx2 mRNA is localized toward the vegetal pole of oocytes, reorients after fertilization, and becomes concentrated in the late-dividing, two-cell-stage blastomere. The asymmetrical distribution of Cdx2 gene products in the oocyte and embryo defines the lineage to trophectoderm.

1 Department of Animal Sciences, Columbia, MO 65211, USA.
2 Department of Biological Sciences, Columbia, MO 65211, USA.
3 Department of Biochemistry, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO 65211, USA.

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: robertsrm{at}missouri.edu

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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)