Fig. 6. Proposed model for Tankyrase-mediated regulation of cytoskeleton stability and cell mechanics through AMOT and YAP–TEAD1 during PSC specification.

Left: pluripotent stem cells (PSCs) growing into high confluence colonies display high Tankyrase activity, in turn keeping the levels of AMOT low, independently of cell–cell interactions. Under such circumstances, YAP is free to shuttle to the nucleus and modulate, among the others, the expression of genes involved in actin stability, like TNIK, PAK1, THY1 and MID1. Right: during mesoderm specification, Tankyrase activity is low, AMOT protein expression increases, so that in confluent cells, YAP can be restricted to the cytoplasm in response to cell–cell contact. In these conditions, cytoskeleton remodelling can occur.