Tracing the cis-regulatory changes underlying the endometrial control of placental invasion

Abstract

Significance Cellular invasion into adjacent tissue is observed in pregnancy, where the fetal placenta invades the mother’s endometrium, and in cancer, where tumor dissemination into stroma is a necessary step before metastasis. The behavior of the surrounding tissue, and its role in either facilitating or resisting this invasion, has not been as deeply studied as the role of the invading cells. The degree of placental invasion into the endometrium varies significantly between different eutherian mammals. Having previously shown that the endometrium of different mammals is significantly responsible for these differences, we identify cis-regulatory elements underlying these differences and show the functional effect of the corresponding transcriptional factors in regulating invasion.