Early stages of induction of anterior head ectodermal properties in Xenopus embryos are mediated by transcriptional cofactor ldb1.

Background: Specific molecules involved in early inductive signaling from anterior neural tissue to the placodal ectoderm to establish a lens-forming bias, as well as their regulatory factors, remain largely unknown. In this study, we sought to identify and characterize these molecules.

Results: Using an expression cloning strategy to isolate genes with lens-inducing activity, we identified the transcriptional cofactor ldb1.