Mof (MYST1 or KAT8) is essential for progression of embryonic development past the blastocyst stage and required for normal chromatin architecture

Abstract

Acetylation of histone tails is a hallmark of transcriptionally active chromatin. Mof (males absent on the first; also called MYST1 or KAT8) is a member of the MYST family of histone acetyltransferases and was originally discovered as an essential component of the X chromosome dosage compensation system in Drosophila. In order to examine the role of Mof in mammals in vivo, we generated mice carrying a null mutation of the Mof gene. All Mof-deflcient embryos fail to develop beyond the expanded blastocyst stage and die at implantation in vivo. Mof-deficient cell lines cannot be derived from Mof -/- embryos in vitro. Mof-/- embryos fail to acetylate histone 4 lysine 16 (H4K16) but have normal a..