Abstract
Regeneration of the lens in newts is quite a unique process. The lens is removed in its entirety and regeneration ensues from the pigment epithelial cells of the dorsal iris via transdifferentiation. The same type of cells from the ventral iris are not capable of regenerating a lens. It is, thus, expected that differences between dorsal and ventral iris during the process of regeneration might provide important clues pertaining to the mechanism of regeneration. In this paper, we employed next generation RNA-seq to determine gene expression patterns during lens regeneration in Notophthalmus viridescens. The expression of more than 38,000 transcripts was compared between dorsal and ventral iris. Although very few genes were found to be dorsal- or ventral-specific, certain groups of genes were up-regulated specifically in the dorsal iris. These genes are involved in cell cycle, gene regulation, cytoskeleton and immune response. In addition, the expression of six highly regulated genes, TBX5, FGF10, UNC5B, VAX2, NR2F5, and NTN1, was verified using qRT-PCR. These graded gene expression patterns provide insight into the mechanism of lens regeneration, the markers that are specific to dorsal or ventral iris, and layout a map for future studies in the field.
Highlights
Amphibians, especially newts, possess regenerative capabilities that are missing in higher vertebrates
Lens regeneration occurs from the iris by a process that involves the transdifferentiation of pigmented epithelial cells (PECs) to lens cells
Another interesting aspect of this process is that lens regeneration occurs only from the dorsal and never from the ventral iris
Summary
Amphibians, especially newts, possess regenerative capabilities that are missing in higher vertebrates. Newts can regenerate their limbs, brain, heart, tail with spinal cord and other tissues. Lens regeneration occurs from the iris by a process that involves the transdifferentiation of pigmented epithelial cells (PECs) to lens cells. Another interesting aspect of this process is that lens regeneration occurs only from the dorsal and never from the ventral iris. This allows the use of the ventral iris as a natural non-regenerative control in lens regeneration experiments [1,2,3]
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