Related Experiment Video
Updated: Nov 12, 2025

Retroviral Infection of Murine Embryonic Stem Cell Derived Embryoid Body Cells for Analysis of Hematopoietic Differentiation
Published on: October 20, 2014
The Regulation and Functions of Endogenous Retrovirus in Embryo Development and Stem Cell Differentiation
Yangquan Xiang1, Hongqing Liang1
1Division of Human Reproduction and Developmental Genetics, Women's Hospital, and Institute of Genetics, Zhejiang University School of Medicine, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China.
Abstract:
Endogenous retroviruses (ERVs) are repetitive sequences in the genome, belonging to the retrotransposon family. During the course of life, ERVs are associated with multiple aspects of chromatin and transcriptional regulation in development and pathological conditions. In mammalian embryos, ERVs are extensively activated in early embryo development, but with a highly restricted spatial-temporal pattern; and they are drastically silenced during differentiation with exceptions in extraembryonic tissue and germlines. The dynamic activation pattern of ERVs raises questions about how ERVs are regulated in the life cycle and whether they are functionally important to cell fate decision during early embryo and somatic cell development. Therefore, in this review, we focus on the pieces of evidence demonstrating regulations and functions of ERVs during stem cell differentiation, which suggests that ERV activation is not a passive result of cell fate transition but the active epigenetic and transcriptional regulation during mammalian development and stem cell differentiation.
More Related Videos
Related Concept Videos
Retroviruses
LTR Retrotransposons
The internal coding region of LTR retrotransposons and their mechanism of transposition closely resembles a...
Maintenance of the ES Cell State
Embryonic Stem Cells
ES cells are grown in a culture medium where they can divide indefinitely, creating ES cell lines. Under certain conditions, ES cells can differentiate, either spontaneously into a variety of...
Embryonic Stem Cells
Mechanisms of Retrovirus-induced Cancers

