Cross-species meta-analysis of transcriptome changes during the morula-to-blastocyst transition: metabolic and physiological changes take center stage

The morula-to-blastocyst transition (MBT) culminates with formation of inner cell mass (ICM) and trophectoderm (TE) lineages. Recent studies identified signaling pathways driving lineage specification, but some features of these pathways display significant species divergence. To better understand evolutionary conservation of the MBT, we completed a meta-analysis of RNA sequencing data from five model species and ICMTE differences from four...