PRMT PRMT 1 regulates astrocytic differentiation of embryonic neural stem/precursor cells

摘要

Abstract Arginine methylation is a post‐translational modification which is catalyzed by protein arginine methyltransferases ( PRMT s). Here, we report that PRMT 1 is highly expressed in neural stem/precursor cells ( NS / PC s) of mouse embryos, and knockdown of PRMT 1 in NS / PC s suppresses the generation of astrocytes. The luciferase assay demonstrated that knockdown of PRMT 1 inhibits activation of the promoter of a typical astrocytic marker gene, glial fibrillary acidic protein ( Gfap ), in NS / PC s. The transcription factor signal transducer and activator of transcription 3 ( STAT 3) is known to generally be critical for astrocytic differentiation of NS / PC s. We found that PRMT 1 methylates arginine residue(s) of STAT 3 to regulate its activity positively, resulting in the promotion of astrocytic differentiation of NS / PC s.