Dual roles of lineage restricted transcription factors The case of MITF in melanocytes

Microphthalmia-associated transcription factor, MITF, is a master regulator of melanocyte development, differentiation, migration and survival. 1 A broad collection of studies have indicated that MITF directly regulates the transcription of genes involved in pigmentation, which are selective to the melanocyte lineage. In addition, MITF controls expression of genes which are expressed in multiple cell lineages and may also play differential roles in activating vs. maintaining gene expression patterns. In this Point-of-View article, we discuss lineage restricted transcription factor activation of both tissue-specific and ubiquitously expressed genes using melanocytes and MITF as a model system that may eventually provide insights into such processes in multiple cell lineages.