Abstract
Enamel is the hardest tissue with the highest degree of mineralization protecting the dental pulp from injury in vertebrates. The ameloblasts differentiated from ectoderm-derived epithelial cells are a single cell layer and are important for the enamel formation and mineralization. Wnt/β-catenin signaling has been proven to exert an important role in the mineralization of bone, dentin and cementum. Little was known about the regulatory mechanism of Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway in ameloblasts during amelogenesis, especially in the mineralization of enamel. To investigate the role of β-catenin in ameloblasts, we established Amelx-Cre; β-catenin∆ex3fl/fl (CA-β-catenin) mice, which could constitutive activate β-catenin in ameloblasts. It showed the delayed mineralization and eventual hypomineralization in the incisor enamel of CA-β-catenin mice. Meanwhile, the amelogenesis-related proteinases Mmp20 and Klk4 were decreased in the incisors of CA-β-catenin mice. These data indicated that β-catenin plays an essential role in differentiation and function of ameloblasts during amelogenesis.
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos: 81570966, 81371141), the Specialized Research Fund for the Doctoral Program of Higher Education (Grant No: 20130072110020) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities.
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Linlin Fan, Yuguang Gao, Chun-Hung Chu and Qi Zhang contributed to conception, design, data acquisition analysis and interpretation, drafted and critically revised the manuscript; Shijian Deng, **n Sui, Mengmeng Liu, Shuhua Cheng, Yunfei Wang contributed to conception, design and data acquisition.
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Fan, L., Deng, S., Sui, X. et al. Constitutive activation of β-catenin in ameloblasts leads to incisor enamel hypomineralization. J Mol Hist 49, 499–507 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10735-018-9788-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10735-018-9788-x