Related Experiment Video

Updated: Oct 26, 2025

A Simple Method to Identify Kinases That Regulate Embryonic Stem Cell Pluripotency by High-throughput Inhibitor Screening
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A Simple Method to Identify Kinases That Regulate Embryonic Stem Cell Pluripotency by High-throughput Inhibitor Screening

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The essential but enigmatic regulatory role of HERVH in pluripotency

Corinne E Sexton1, Richard L Tillett2, Mira V Han3

  • 1School of Life Sciences, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV 89154, USA.

Trends in Genetics : TIG
|August 3, 2021
PubMed

Human specific endogenous retrovirus H (HERVH) is highly expressed in both naive and primed stem cells and is essential for pluripotency. Despite the proven relationship between HERVH expression and pluripotency, there is no single definitive model for the function of HERVH. Instead, several hypotheses of a regulatory function have been put forward including HERVH acting as enhancers, long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs), and most recently as markers of topologically associating domain (TAD) boundaries. Recently several enhancer-associated lncRNAs have been characterized, which bind to Mediator and are necessary for promoter-enhancer folding interactions. We propose a synergistic model of HERVH function combining relevant findings and discuss the current limitations for its role in regulation, including the lack of evidence for a pluripotency-associated target gene.

Keywords:
endogenous retrovirusenhancergene regulationmediator, topologically associating domain (TAD)stem cell

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