Mechanism and Stem-Cell Activity of 5-CarboxycytOsine Decarboxylation Determined by Isotope Tracing

摘要

5-Methylcytosine (mC) is an important, well-known nucleo-base modification that is involved in many biological processes, including gene expression, genomic imprinting, X-chromosome inactivation, and suppression of transposable elements. Recently it was discovered that mC can be further processed in neurons and in embryonic stem cells by TET enzymes, which utilize 2-ketoglutarate, to oxidize mC first to 5-hydroxymethylcytosine (hmC) and further to 5-formylcytosine (fC) and 5-carboxycytosine (caC) (Scheme 1).