AAV with CAG2 promoter driven CreERT2

This AAV expresses CreERT2 driven by an ubiquitous CAG2 promoter.

The CAG2 promoter is derived from the commonly used 1.8kb CAG/CBA (also called CAGGS) promoter. To increase the cloning capacity of size-limiting vectors using the CAG promoter, such as AAV or lentiviral vectors, CAG2 was developed by deleting a portion of about 0.6Kb of the chicken beta-actin intron from the original CAG promoter.

A mutated form of estrogen ligand-binding domain (ERT2) that binds to synthetic antagonists (such as tamoxifen or its derivative 4-hydroxy-tamoxifen) but not to circulating estrogen, was fused to the Cre recombinase (Cre) to create CreERT2 (also known as "inducible Cre"). When tamoxifen binds to CreERT2, it induces a conformational change of CreERT2, leading to its nuclear translocation, followed by Cre/Lox-mediated recombination.