{"doi":"10.1387/ijdb.240029lj","title":"Disrupted odontoblast differentiation and dentin dysplasia in <i>Epiprofin</i> -deficient mice","abstract":"Tooth formation is a process tightly regulated by reciprocal interactions between epithelial and mesenchymal tissues. These epithelial-mesenchyme interactions regulate the expression of target genes via transcription factors. Among the regulatory elements governing this process, Epiprofin/Sp6 is a zinc finger transcription factor which is expressed in the embryonic dental epithelium and in differentiating pre-odontoblasts. Epiprofin knockout ( Epfn -/-) mice present severe dental abnormalities, such as supernumerary teeth and enamel hypoplasia. Here, we describe dentin defects in molars and incisors of Epfn -/- mice. We observed that in the absence of Epfn, markers of early odontoblast differentiation, such as alkaline phosphatase activity, Dsp/Dpp expression, and Collagen Type I deposition, are downregulated. In addition, the expression of tight and gap junction proteins was severely impaired in the predontoblastic cell layer of developing Epfn -/- molars. Altogether, our data shows that Epfn is crucial for the proper differentiation of dental mesenchymal cells towards functional odontoblasts and subsequent dentin-matrix deposition.","journal":"The International Journal of Developmental Biology","year":2024,"id":479784,"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":1,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9555,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2024-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":438037,"name":"Susana de Vega","orcid":"0000-0001-7362-7283","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1318822,"name":"Gaskon Ibarretxe","orcid":"0000-0002-4961-7402","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":302992,"name":"Takashi Nakamura","orcid":"0000-0001-9904-1037","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1318823,"name":"Fernando Unda","orcid":"0000-0001-7616-5280","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":1318821,"name":"Lucía Jiménez‐Rojo","orcid":"0000-0003-1699-8437","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":30,"raw_metadata":null,"created_at":"2026-07-19T02:06:54.284166Z","pmid":"38591690","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":[]}