CTR Members and Babraham Institute Researchers Paulina Latos and Myriam Hemberger have recently had a paper published in Genes & Development.
Elf5-centered transcription factor hub controls trophoblast stem cell self-renewal and differentiation through stoichiometry-sensitive shifts in target gene networks. Stem cell research led by the Babraham Institute has uncovered key new knowledge about how placental stem cells switch between maintaining a stem cell identity to setting off down the route to becoming specialised cell types. Intuitively, one would think that more of a good thing should be even better – specifically in the context of factors that maintain the self-renewing character of a stem cell. However, research from the Babraham Institute in association with the Centre for Trophoblast Research has found that this is certainly not the case for trophoblast stem cells from which the fundamental cell types of the placenta are derived. In looking at transcription factors – key orchestrators of the genes expressed in any given cell – the Babraham team observed that it is not simply their presence or absence that determines the stem cell state, but the finely tuned balance between them. See the Babraham Institute website for more details.