RETRACTED ARTICLE: Production of viable chicken by allogeneic transplantation of primordial germ cells induced from somatic cells
Ruifeng Zhao, Qisheng Zuo, Xia Yuan, Kai Jin, Jing Jin, Ying Ding, Chen Zhang, Tingting Li, Jingyi Jiang, Jiancheng Li, Ming Zhang, Xiang Shi, Hongyan Sun, Yani Zhang, Qi Xu, Guobin Chang, Zhenhua Zhao, Bing Li, Xinsheng Wu, Yang Zhang, Jiuzhou Song, Guohong Chen, Bichun Li, Bichun Li, Bichun Li
Abstract
The allogeneic transplantation of primordial germ cells (PGCs) derived from somatic cells overcomes the limitation of avian cloning. Here, we transdifferentiate chicken embryo fibroblasts (CEFs) from black feathered Langshan chickens to PGCs and transplant them into White Plymouth Rock chicken embryos to produce viable offspring with characteristics inherited from the donor. We express Oct4/Sox2/Nanog/Lin28A (OSNL) to reprogram CEFs to induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), which are further induced to differentiate into PGCs by BMP4/BMP8b/EGF. DNA demethylation, histone acetylation and glycolytic activation elevate the iPSC induction efficiency, while histone acetylation and glycolytic inhibition facilitate PGCs formation. The induced PGCs (iPGCs) are transplanted into the recipients, which are self-crossed to produce 189/509 somatic cells derived chicken with the donor's characteristics. Microsatellite analysis and genome sequencing confirm the inheritance of genetic information from the donor. Thus, we demonstrate the feasibility of avian cloning from somatic cells.