Figure 3

Identification of genes that mimic expression of crystallins during CLT. A) Strategy for identifying CLT specific genes by microarray. Lenses were removed from stage 50 tadpoles and used for RNA extraction of samples L1-3 (differentiated lens). The tadpoles that had undergone lentectomy were allowed to recover for three days before harvesting the cornea for samples R1-3 (regenerating). Finally, a second set of tadpoles were subjected to mock surgery, the cornea was cut, lifted and replaced as for lentectomy but the inner cornea and lens were left in situ. After 3 days corneas were recovered from these animals, generating samples S1, 3 and 4 (sham operated). B) Heatmap of Affymetrix array data showing that the pattern of crystallin expression varies among replicate R samples, with R2 consistently lower. An average expression was used to search for similar patterns in the data. C) Heatmap of top 50 significant matches to the crystallin pattern, excluding the crystallin genes used to generate the pattern average. R/S is the ratio of transcript expression in R1-3 vs. S1, 3 and 4 levels. Bold type in C indicates R > 1.5 × S.