Functional analysis of insulin-like growth factor-II antisense transcripts in mouse and pig.

Imprinting is an epigenetic mechanism in mammals and has an important role in development. The IGF2 locus is involved in several imprinting disorder and in cancer. This study will provide insights into specific expression patterns and epigenetic modifications at the IGF2 locus during different stages of development and in different tissues. We study IGF2AS transcripts to elucidate basic functions of non-coding RNAs in gene regulation including epigenetic modifications. The study may shed light on IGF2 and IGF2AS regulation and expression in Wilms’ tumor, colorectal cancer and also in human imprinting disorders .This is stated based on the high homology between the IGF2 gene clusters in pig and human.

Additionally from expression studies we expect to gain insight of the development and tissue specific expression of the IGF2/IGF2AS pair. An in vitro study of down regulated IGF2AS transcripts in differentiating C2C12 cells will provide detailed view of their implication in cell growth and differentiation.