129S4.Cg-Tg(Sox10-ERT2/cre/ERT2)17Sor/J

Stock number: 028658
Product name: SECE17
Research areas: Cancer Research, Developmental Biology Research, Research Tools

Description

This Sox10ER^T2CreER^T2 (SECE17) strain, carrying a transgene with tamoxifen inducible Cre recombinase under the control of the Sox10 MCS4 enhancer/c-Fos minimal promoter, may be useful for generating spatiotemporal neural crest cell specific targeted mutants for studies of neural crest-derived cell populations during embryonic development.

Detailed description

These transgenic mice express a tamoxifen inducible Cre recombinase, ERT2/cre/ERT2, driven by the mouse Sox10 MCS4 enhancer/c-Fos minimal promoter.

ERT2/cre/ERT2 (also known as ERiCreER) has been shown to tightly regulate inducible Cre recombinase activity with no detectable recombination activity without 4-hydroxytamoxifen. When crossed with a strain containing a loxP site flanked sequence of interest, the offspring are useful for generating tamoxifen-induced, Cre-mediated targeted deletions. Tamoxifen administration induces Cre recombination in neural crest cells. Heterozygotes are viable and fertile. The Donating Investigator has not attempted to make the strain homozygous, but predicts homozygotes would be viable.

The Cre-ERT2 fusion protein consists of Cre recombinase fused to a triple mutant form of the human estrogen receptor which does not bind its natural ligand (17β-estradiol) at physiological concentrations but will bind the synthetic estrogen receptor ligands 4-hydroxytamoxifen (OHT or tamoxifen) and, with lesser sensitivity, ICI 182780. Restricted to the cytoplasm, Cre-ERT2 and ERT2/cre/ERT2 (also known as ERiCreER) can only gain access to the nuclear compartment after exposure to tamoxifen. To counteract the mixed estrogen agonist effects of tamoxifen injections, which can result in late fetal abortions in pregnant mice, progesterone may be coadministered.

Development

A transgenic insert designed by Dr. Philippe Soriano (School of Medicine at Mount Sinai) containing Cre recombinase coding sequences flanked by two ERT2 domains (from the pCAGER^T2CreER^T2 plasmid), followed by the rabbit globin poly-adenylation sequence, under the control of the mouse Sox10 MCS4 enhancer/c-Fos minimal promoter, was injected into C57BL/6 X C3H zygotes. Founder line SECE17 was subsequently established. The mice were then backcrossed to 129S4/SvJaeSor for 9 generations.

Upon arrival, sperm was cryopreserved. To establish our live colony, an aliquot of frozen sperm was used to fertilize 129S4/SvJaeJ oocytes (Stock No. 009104).

Allele

Symbol: Tg(Sox10-ERT2/cre/ERT2)17Sor
Name: transgene insertion 17, Philippe Soriano
MGI accession ID: MGI:5697877
Generation method: Transgenic
Attributes: Recombinase-expressing; Inducible
Marker symbol: Tg(Sox10-ERT2/cre/ERT2)17Sor
Marker name: transgene insertion 17, Philippe Soriano
Chromosome: UN
Strain of origin: C57BL/6 x C3H
Expressed genes: cre/ERT2,Cre recombinase and estrogen receptor 1 (human) fusion gene,
Site of expression: Tamoxifen administration induces Cre recombination in neural crest cells.
Molecular note: The Multiple Species Conserved Sequence 4 (MCS 4) distal enhancer with a c-Fos minimal promoter drives neural crest cell and derivatives-specific expression of an inducible cre recombinase gene flanked by two modified estrogen receptors (ERT2/cre/ERT2) followed by a rabbit globin polyadenylation sequence. Two lines were generated with line 17 selected as the representative line.