Fatemeh Mirzadeh - Department of Molecular Genetics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran
Mahshid Malakootian - Cardiogenetic Research Center, Rajaie Cardiovascular Medical and Research Center, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran
Seyed Javad Mowla - Department of Molecular Genetics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran

POU5F1 (OCT4) is a master regulator of self-renewal in embryonicstem cells and can potentially encode several spliced variants, includingOCT4A, OCT4B, OCT4B1, and OCT4C/C1. The long non-coding RNA(lncRNA) PSORS1C3 is located upstream of OCT4 gene. It is alreadyreported that lncRNAs have an enhancing effect on the expression oftheir downstream genes. As we have shown previously, PSORS1C3 isvigorously spliced to generate 24 novel spliced variants, and that a positivecorrelation exits between its expression and that of OCT4. Herein, weused a CRISPR-Cas9 approach to remove the promoter of PSORS1C3,and then evaluated the transcriptome alterations in the edited cells. Ourdata approved a regulatory effect of PSORS1C3 on OCT4 expression.Moreover, our data revealed new targets of PSORS1C3. Altogether, ourdata has clarified a new aspect of OCT4 regulation by different variantsof PSORS1C3 in stem and cancer cells.

OCT4; Embryonic stem cells; Gene expression