TY - JOUR AU - Jin Zuo-lin AU - Zhang Yong-kuan AU - Sun Hai-yan AU - Lin Zhu AU - Bi Ying-chun AU - Duan Yin-zhong AU - Ding Yin PY - 2016 TI - Osteogenic-related gene expression profiles of human dental follicle cells induced by dexamethasone JF - Acta Pharmacologica Sinica; Vol 29, No 9 (September 2008): Acta Pharmacologica Sinica Y2 - 2016 KW - N2 - Aim: Human dental follicle cells (hDFC) have the ability to differentiate into mineralized tissue-forming cells during root and periodontal development or osteogenic induction in vitro . The present study aimed to validate the osteogenic induction of hDFC by dexamethasone (DEX) and to explore the changes of related genes responsible for the osteogenic differentiation process. Methods: Passage-cultured hDFC were induced by DEX and analyzed for mineralization activity by morphological observation, alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity, and alizarin red S staining. GEArray Q series human osteogenesis gene array was used to describe large-scale gene expression in treated hDFC compared to the control group. Quantitative real-time RT-PCR was performed to confirm the microarray data by analyzing the expression of 7 critical transcripts. Results: Osteogenic differentiation of hDFC was confirmed by morphological change, elevated ALP activity and calcified nodules. In 96 genes investigated through the microarray analysis, 20 genes were upregulated and 8 genes were downregulated more than 2-fold. The results of the real-time RT-PCR correlated with the microarray analysis. The expression of the transforming growth factor-β superfamily showed varying degrees of increase, and fibroblast growth factors exhibited a differential changing trend of expression. The expression of most types of collagen genes representative of extracellular matrixes increased under DEX treatment while small mothers against decapentaplegic 6 and 7 expressions significantly decreased. Conclusion: Our results demonstrated that hDFC displayed osteoblastic features in both phenotypic and genotypic traits induced by DEX in vitro . UR - http://www.chinaphar.com/article/view/6048