近日，在“发育与生殖研究”领域国家重大科学研究计划、国家自然科学基金重大研究计划和重庆市科委的资助下，西南大学教授罗凌飞在细胞周期与胚胎式建成的偶联协调机构研究方面取得了新的进展，相关研究发表在最近一期的《细胞生物学杂志》（The Journal of Cell Biology，2004年至2008年平均影响因子为10.052）上。
在胚胎的发育过程中，有两个方面至关重要。一方面是细胞分裂/细胞周期，通过无数次的细胞分裂，胚胎发育从一个单细胞受精卵发育为多细胞成体。另一方面是细胞分化和模式建成，通过细胞分化和模式建成才能使得多种不同形态和功能的组织器官出现。这两个方面在胚胎发育过程中是相互对话、相互偶联并严格协调的。
迄今为止，尽管在细胞周期和模式建成过程中的许多重要调控因子已被发现，其功能也得到了深入研究，但对胚胎发育中的这两个方面如何相互对话、相互偶联协调的分子机制却知之甚少。罗凌飞实验室以斑马鱼为模式动物，经过近三年的研究，发现了细胞周期与原肠期胚胎模式建成之间偶联协调的分子机制，同时回答了为什么细胞凋亡恰好从原肠期开始出现的问题。（生物谷Bioon.com）
生物谷推荐原始出处：
The Journal of Cell Biology, Vol. 184, No. 6, 805-815 doi:10.1083/jcb.200806074
NF-κB and Snail1a coordinate the cell cycle with gastrulation
Xiaolin Liu1,2, Sizhou Huang1,2, Jun Ma1,2, Chun Li1,2, Yaoguang Zhang1, and Lingfei Luo1,2
1 Key Laboratory of Aquatic Organism Reproduction and Development, Ministry of Education, Key Laboratory of Aquatic Science of Chongqing, and 2 Laboratory of Molecular Developmental Biology, School of Life Science, Southwest University, Beibei, 400715 Chongqing, China
The cell cycle needs to strictly coordinate with developmental processes to ensure correct generation of the body plan and different tissues. However, the molecular mechanism underlying the coordination remains largely unknown. In this study, we investigate how the cell cycle coordinates gastrulation cell movements in zebrafish. We present a system to modulate the cell cycle in early zebrafish embryos by manipulating the geminin-Cdt1 balance. Alterations of the cell cycle change the apoptotic level during gastrulation, which correlates with the nuclear level of antiapoptotic nuclear factor κB (NF-κB). NF-κB associates with the Snail1a promoter region on the chromatin and directly activates Snail1a, an important factor controlling cell delamination, which is the initial step of mesendodermal cell movements during gastrulation. In effect, the cell cycle coordinates the delamination of mesendodermal cells through the transcription of Snail1a. Our results suggest a molecular mechanism by which NF-B and Snail1a coordinate the cell cycle through gastrulation.
