I-39: Exploring New Frontiers in Human Y Chromosome Proteome Project

The major goal of the Chromosome-Centric Human Proteome Project (C-HPP) is to systematically map the entire human proteome with the intent to enhance our understanding of human biology at the cellular level. However, this goal may be hindered by the lack of quality observations of given proteins due to absence of expression in a given tissue, very low abundance, and expression only in rare samples. We applied a cell-based approach to analyze the expression of genes located on male specific region of human Y chromosome (MSY). We analyzed the expression pattern of MSY genes at transcript and protein levels during differentiation of human embryonic stem cell and human neuron-committed teratocarcinoma cell lines to dopaminergic neurons. We observed that several MSY genes/proteins previously known as testis specific were highly upregulated during differentiation. Further interesting results were observed when human embryonic and adult stem cells were differentiated to other cell types. We also present data showing that suppression of MSY gene combined with shotgun quantitative proteomic approach of resulting cells can enhance our insights about MSY gene function. Our results highlight the importance of utilizing cell-based approach particularly stem cells and their derivatives to enhance the quality of observations for MSY proteins and to increase our understanding about their eminent biological roles in specific target cells.