MicroRNA in Neural Crest development and Neurocristopathies

Antonaci, Marco (2024) MicroRNA in Neural Crest development and Neurocristopathies. Doctoral thesis, University of East Anglia.

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Abstract

The neural crest (NC) is a multipotent population of cells, unique for vertebrates, that originates during late gastrulation/early neurulation. The origin of this population of cells is in the region between the neural ectoderm and the non-neural ectoderm. During the development of the embryo, neural crest cells (NCCs) undergo different waves of migration thanks to a process called epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT). This process allows NCCs to migrate towards the whole developing embryo.

At the end of this process, NCCs differentiate to give rise to an astonishing number of derivatives in the adult organism. These derivatives range from the craniofacial skeleton, teeth, cardiac cells, chromaffin cells of the adrenal gland, enteric ganglia, and pigment cells. Because of this, failure during NC development can cause a variety of diseases, often syndromic. These diseases are globally called neurocristopathies (NCPs).

In recent years, the attention of research has moved from the coding regions of the genome to the non-coding regions. This includes long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs), Piwi-interacting RNAs (piRNAs) and micro RNAs (miRNAs). In particular, miRNAs are small RNA molecules (~22nt in length) that are mainly involved in post-transcriptional regulation of gene expression. As for the mechanism of action, they mainly target the 3’ untranslated region (UTR) of mRNAs in a sequence-specific manner and promote their degradation, resulting in the downregulation of gene expression.

The aim of my research is to investigate how miRNAs regulate the development of the NC, and to identify possible miRNAs that might be involved in the onset of NCPs. To do this, I mainly used the African clawed frog Xenopus tropicalis as model organism, and tuned the expression of specific miRNAs to investigate any NC-specific phenotype. By doing so, we described a novel molecular mechanism involving the role of xtr-miR-204-1 during Xenopus tropicalis eye development. These findings open to the exciting possibility that miRNAs might be involved in more molecular processes than previously thought, highlighting the importance of studying these genetic regulators during physiological and pathological conditions.

Item Type:	Thesis (Doctoral)
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Science > School of Biological Sciences
Depositing User:	Chris White
Date Deposited:	18 Mar 2025 14:54
Last Modified:	18 Mar 2025 14:54
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/98788
DOI:

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