{"doi":"10.1016/j.exer.2023.109637","title":"A simple, rapid fluorescent reporter-based method for detection of ectopic cre recombinase expression in presumed retinal cell type-targeted mouse lines","abstract":"Although cell type-specific Cre recombinase-expressing mouse lines are commonly used to generate conditional knockout of genes of interest, germline recombination and ectopic \"leakiness\" in Cre recombinase expression in non-specific cell types has been observed in several neuronal and glial-specific Cre lines. This often leads to inadvertent loss of conditional mouse lines, requiring rederivation. It is therefore imperative to be able to monitor and validate cell type-specific Cre recombinase-mediated gene editing. Herein, we describe a simple, inexpensive, rapid ZsGreen fluor-reporter-based strategy for genotype-free identification of ectopic leakiness using a custom-designed, 3-D blue LED light box. We assessed cell type-specific expression in several allegedly specific Cre recombinase mouse lines commonly used in vision research: retinal pigment epithelium (RPE)-specific (VMD2 (Best1) Cre, RPE65 Cre); astrocyte-specific (GFAP Cre); as well as photoreceptor-bipolar progenitor cell-specific (CRX Cre). Our standardized workflow allows facile, rapid identification of ectopic and non-specific Cre recombinase expression in any presume specific Cre mouse line, without the need for genotyping and without causing animal distress.","journal":"Experimental Eye Research","year":2023,"id":364444,"datarank":0.0,"base_score":0.0,"endowment":0.0,"self_citation_contribution":0.0,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.0,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":7,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9574,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2023-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":415861,"name":"Steven J. Fliesler","orcid":"0000-0002-2557-142X","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":415860,"name":"Sriganesh Ramachandra Rao","orcid":"0000-0003-1029-1051","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":46,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T01:14:36.728255Z","pmid":"37659708","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}