Protein degradation shapes developmental tempo in mouse and human neural progenitors

Abstract

The pace of embryonic development differs markedly across mammalian species, yet the molecular mechanisms underlying these tempo differences remain largely unknown. Here, we systematically compared protein dynamics in mouse and human neural progenitors (NPs) and examined how protein stability influences developmental timing. We find that mouse NPs exhibit faster protein production and degradation than human NPs. Human NPs display broadly increased protein half-lives, independent of cellular compartment or protein function, and this difference persists in post-mitotic neurons. Consistent with this, proteasomal activity is lower in human embryonic spinal cord and stem cell-derived neural progenitors than mouse, correlating with reduced expression of proteasome-associated proteins. Functionally, accelerating the degradation of the key transcriptional repressor IRX3 in mouse NPs speeds the activation of its target gene, providing causal evidence that protein turnover modulates developmental tempo. These results reveal that species-specific regulation of protein degradation shapes the timing of neural development and suggest that evolutionary tuning of proteasomal activity contributes to differences in embryonic developmental pace.