Transcription profiling of rat wild type and Pax6 mutant hindbrain and forebrain samples

Pax6 is a transcription factor that is expressed in neuroepithelial cells from the initial stage of brain development. Region specific expression of Pax6 plays pivotal roles in the developing CNS, including brain patterning, neuronal specification, neuronal migration, and axonal projection. Regarding neurogenesis, Pax6 multiply works either as to promote neuronal differentiation or cell proliferation in a highly context-dependent manner. However, no Pax6 target gene is identified as to promote proliferation and/or inhibit differentiation of neuroepithelial cells. Here, we performed comparative analysis using the Affymetrix U34A array to identify genes that are differentially expressed in the early stage of wild-type and Pax6 homozygous mutant rat (rSey2/rSey2) brains.