Investigating the regulatory role of KMT2D in neurodeveolopment using organoid and single cell techniques

Enhancer-mediated gene activation of lineage-specifiers, together with extrinsic niche factors, determines cell fate. Mutations in KMT2D, the H3K4me1-catalyzing enhancer-activator, result in ~70% of the KABUKI syndrome, a neurodevelopmental disorder. Yet the impacted cell-of-origin and the bona fide targets of KMT2D in human neurodevelopment are missing. Here we applied cerebral organoid and single-cell technologies to delineate human-specific distal regulatory elements across heterogeneous cell types.