Development of cell labeling and gene editing tools in urochordate CionaShow others and affiliations
2025 (English)In: Marine Life Science and Technology, ISSN 2096-6490, Vol. 7, p. 730-741, article id e3002762Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]
Urochordate Ciona spp. are ideal marine model organisms for studying embryogenesis and developmental and evolutionary biology. However, the effective implementation of genetic labeling and CRISPR/Cas9-based editing tools at cellular resolution remains challenging. This study successfully developed and validated a collection of Gateway-based vectors for cell labeling in Ciona spp. The destination vector sets contained two Gateway cassettes flanked by Minos sites, allowing the N- or C-terminal tagging of a protein of interest with various fluorescent markers. In addition, we optimized the CRISPR/Cas9 and CRISPR/dCas9 systems by incorporating P2A-mCherry, a fluorescent indicator for Cas9 expression at cellular resolution. We demonstrated the effective destruction or inhibition of target genes when CRISPR constructs were introduced into fertilized eggs. Furthermore, we engineered a dual fluorescence sensor system that helps visualize successful gene knockouts at the cellular level in specific tissues. The genetic tools developed in this study offer a robust method for gene expression, cell tracking, and subcellular protein localization while also facilitating tissue-specific functional analysis in Ciona embryos and other model systems.
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Springer Nature, 2025. Vol. 7, p. 730-741, article id e3002762
Keywords [en]
Cell labeling, Ciona, CRISPR/Cas9, Fluorescent sensor, Gateway
National Category
Biochemistry Molecular Biology
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:umu:diva-240950DOI: 10.1007/s42995-025-00300-1ISI: 001501042000001PubMedID: 41322270Scopus ID: 2-s2.0-105007090738OAI: oai:DiVA.org:umu-240950DiVA, id: diva2:1979780
2025-07-012025-07-012026-01-07Bibliographically approved