Abstract
Tet proteins regulate gene expression by removing methyl groups from DNA bases. This activity may be a facilitating step in turning on the cell-division pathway that produces sperm and egg cells. See Letter p.443 DNA methylation on cytosine is an important epigenetic modification, and the mechanisms controlling 5-methylcytosine (5mC) dynamics constitute an active area of research. The Tet family of dioxygenases can catalyse oxidation of 5mC to produce derivatives such as 5-hydroxymethylcytosine (5hmC), but little is known about the biological function of Tet proteins. Here, a loss-of-function approach in mice is used to show that Tet1 has a role in meiosis and meiotic gene activation in female germ cells. Tet1 deficiency does not greatly impact genome-wide demethylation, but has a more specific effect on the expression of a subset of meiotic genes.
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