E-cadherin-mediated cell-cell adhesion and signaling plays an essential role in development and maintenance of healthy epithelial tissues. Adhesiveness is conferred by cadherin extracellular domains, and is regulated by an assembly of adaptors and enzymes associated with the cytoplasmic tail. Here, we employed proximity biotinylation and quantitative proteomics to isolate and identify 612 proteins in the vicinity of E-cadherin's cytoplasmic tail. We used a structureinformed database of protein-protein interactions to construct the most comprehensive E-cadherin interactome to date, containing 89 known E-cadhesome components and 346 novel proteins. Moreover, through cloning and expression of GFP-tagged fusion proteins we localized 26 of the novel proteins to adherens junctions. Finally, employing calcium depletion and myosin inhibition we show the E-cadherin interactome to be remarkably robust to perturbation and essentially independent of cell-cell junctions or actomyosin contractility.

The extracellular matrix (ECM) constitutes the follicular basal lamina and is also present between follicular cells. Remodeling of the ECM is believed to be a key event in follicular development, especially follicular selection, and plays important roles in cell migration, survival, and steroidogenesis. miR-199-3p is differentially expressed in the goose follicular granulosa layer during follicular selection and is reported to play a primary role in inhibiting cell migration and invasion. Nevertheless, the effect of miR-199-3p on ovarian follicles and its role in follicular cellular migration are not understood. In this study, we demonstrated by qRT-PCR that miR-199-3p was differentially expressed in the granulosa layer from goose ovarian follicles before and after follicular selection. Additionally, we found that miR-199-3p overexpression could significantly suppress cell viability and migration, as well as elevate both the concentration of progesterone and the expression of key progesterone production genes in cultured granulosa cells (GCs) from goose pre-hierarchical follicles. Furthermore, using dual-fluorescence reporter experiments on 293T cells, we confirmed that miR-199-3p downregulated the expression of the ECM gene ITGB8 by directly targeting its mRNA three prime untranslated region (3′ UTR). Finally, we found that miR-199-3p overexpression in the GCs of goose pre-hierarchical follicles inhibited the expression of two ECM-related genes ( MMP9 and MMP15 ) yet promoted the expression of another two ECM-related genes ( COL4A1 and LAMA1 ). Taken together, these findings suggest that miR-199-3p participates in granulosa cell migration, viability, and steroidogenesis in goose ovarian follicles before selection by targeting ITGB8 and modulating other ECM-related genes. These data highlight the key roles of miR-199-3p in follicular cell migration, viability, and steroidogenesis by regulating ECM-related genes and thus contribute to a better understanding of the mechanisms underlying follicle selection in birds.