Establishment of Rat Embryonic Stem Cell Lines That Can Participate in Germline Chimerae at High Efficiency

摘要

Laboratory rats (Rattus norvegicus) have been used more extensively than mice in the research fields of neuroscience, pharmacology, and toxicology. Functional germline-competent embryonic stem (ES) cell lines or induced pluripotent stem cell lines, which are essential in reverse genetics approach, have been recently established in the rat (Buehr et al., 2008; Li et al., 2008; Liao et al., 2009). Sooner or later, homologous recombinationbased gene targeting in such stem cell lines will allow for the production and analysis of individual rats with targeted mutation as routinely done in mice. Here we report rat ES cell lines that can participate in chimerae and transmit the characteristics through germline at high efficiency.