The Binding Occupancy of Pro-Hypertrophic Transcription Factors among Cardiac Developmental Enhancers

Abstract

Objective: To check which of the eight pro-hypertrophic transcription factors bind in abundance to a set of 140
functionally confirmed cardiac enhancers aiming to identify potential therapeutic targets for delaying the onset
of cardiac hypertrophy.
Study Design: Bioinformatics, in-Silico Study.
Place and Duration of Study: The study was conducted at the Department of Biological Sciences, National
University of Medical Sciences (NUMS), Rawalpindi, Pakistan, from January 2022 to December 2022.
Methods: For experimentally verified human and mouse noncoding regions with gene enhancer activity
measured in transgenic mice, VISTA Enhancer Browser was used to obtain 140 cardiac-specific functionally
confirmed enhancers. Among these enhancers, transcription factor binding sites were computationally
mapped to assess transcription factor occupancy. The binding sites for all eight transcription factors were
screened in the collective set of 140 cardiac enhancers via an in-house script.
Results: In this study, among a small set of eight pro-hypertrophic transcription factors, occupancy of
transcription factor HAND (Heart- And Neural Crest Derivatives-Expressed Protein) was found to be maximum
in the collected pool of functionally confirmed cardiac enhancers.
Conclusion: The transcription factor HAND was found to have maximum binding occupancy among a set of
experimentally confirmed cardiac enhancers.

How to cite this: Raza RZ, Hussain I, Akhtar F, Mumtaz S. The Binding Occupancy of Pro-Hypertrophic Transcription Factors among Cardiac Developmental Enhancers. Life and Science. 2024; 5(1): 22-26. doi: http://doi.org/10.37185/LnS.1.1.464