bims-crepig 2020-12-13 papers

bims-crepig

Biomed News

on Chromatin regulation and epigenetics in cell fate and cancer

Issue of 2020–12–13
thirty-two papers selected by
Connor Rogerson, University of Cambridge, MRC Cancer Unit

Conserved Epigenetic Regulatory Logic Infers Genes Governing Cell Identity.
Pioneer-like factor GAF cooperates with PBAP (SWI/SNF) and NURF (ISWI) to regulate transcription.
H1 histones control the epigenetic landscape by local chromatin compaction.
Molecular Co-occupancy Identifies Transcription Factor Binding Cooperativity In Vivo.
Simultaneous epigenetic perturbation and genome imaging reveal distinct roles of H3K9me3 in chromatin architecture and transcription.
Histone H1 loss drives lymphoma by disrupting 3D chromatin architecture.
Argonaute NRDE-3 and MBT domain protein LIN-61 redundantly recruit an H3K9me3 HMT to prevent embryonic lethality and transposon expression.
A Role for the Mre11-Rad50-Xrs2 Complex in Gene Expression and Chromosome Organization.
Flanking sequence preference modulates de novo DNA methylation in the mouse genome.
CAF-1 and Rtt101p function within the replication-coupled chromatin assembly network to promote H4 K16ac, preventing ectopic silencing.
H4K20 Methylation Is Differently Regulated by Dilution and Demethylation in Proliferating and Cell-Cycle-Arrested Xenopus Embryos.
Epigenomic Reprogramming toward Mesenchymal-Epithelial Transition in Ovarian-Cancer-Associated Mesenchymal Stem Cells Drives Metastasis.
TINC- A Method to Dissect Regulatory Complexes at Single-Locus Resolution- Reveals an Extensive Protein Complex at the Nanog Promoter.
Kdm6a suppresses the alternative activation of macrophages and impairs energy expenditure in obesity.
The Hippo pathway coactivator Yorkie can reprogram cell fates and create compartment-boundary-like interactions at clone margins.
A Positive Feedback Loop Between TGFβ and Androgen Receptor Supports Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Anoikis Resistance.
ZNF410 Uniquely Activates the NuRD Component CHD4 to Silence Fetal Hemoglobin Expression.
Pontin arginine methylation by CARM1 is crucial for epigenetic regulation of autophagy.
An epigenetic gene silencing pathway selectively acting on transgenic DNA in the green alga Chlamydomonas.
Single-Cell Sequencing of Developing Human Gut Reveals Transcriptional Links to Childhood Crohn's Disease.
Genome-wide off-rates reveal how DNA binding dynamics shape transcription factor function.
Gene regulation gravitates towards either addition or multiplication when combining the effects of two signals.
STARRPeaker: uniform processing and accurate identification of STARR-seq active regions.
Histone benzoylation serves as an epigenetic mark for DPF and YEATS family proteins.
The Master Regulator Protein BAZ2B Can Reprogram Human Hematopoietic Lineage-Committed Progenitors into a Multipotent State.
The Nuclear Receptor ESRRA Protects from Kidney Disease by Coupling Metabolism and Differentiation.
Cryo-EM Structures Reveal Transcription Initiation Steps by Yeast Mitochondrial RNA Polymerase.
Evidence of widespread, independent sequence signature for transcription factor cobinding.
Epigenomic differences in the human and chimpanzee genomes are associated with structural variation.
Epigenetic landscape of pancreatic neuroendocrine tumours reveals distinct cells of origin and means of tumour progression.
Enhancer-bound Nrf2 licenses HIF-1α transcription under hypoxia to promote cisplatin resistance in hepatocellular carcinoma cells.
Nuclear cGAS Functions Non-canonically to Enhance Antiviral Immunity via Recruiting Methyltransferase Prmt5.

Cell Syst. 2020 Dec 01. pii: S2405-4712(20)30419-1. [Epub ahead of print]

Conserved Epigenetic Regulatory Logic Infers Genes Governing Cell Identity.

Woo Jun Shim, Enakshi Sinniah, Jun Xu, Burcu Vitrinel, Michael Alexanian, Gaia Andreoletti, Sophie Shen, Yuliangzi Sun, Brad Balderson, Carles Boix, Guangdun Peng, Naihe Jing, Yuliang Wang, Manolis Kellis, Patrick P L Tam, Aaron Smith, Michael Piper, Lionel Christiaen, Quan Nguyen, Mikael Bodén, Nathan J Palpant.

  Determining genes that orchestrate cell differentiation in development and disease remains a fundamental goal of cell biology. This study establishes a genome-wide metric based on the gene-repressive trimethylation of histone H3 at lysine 27 (H3K27me3) across hundreds of diverse cell types to identify genetic regulators of cell differentiation. We introduce a computational method, TRIAGE, which uses discordance between gene-repressive tendency and expression to identify genetic drivers of cell identity. We apply TRIAGE to millions of genome-wide single-cell transcriptomes, diverse omics platforms, and eukaryotic cells and tissue types. Using a wide range of data, we validate the performance of TRIAGE in identifying cell-type-specific regulatory factors across diverse species including human, mouse, boar, bird, fish, and tunicate. Using CRISPR gene editing, we use TRIAGE to experimentally validate RNF220 as a regulator of Ciona cardiopharyngeal development and SIX3 as required for differentiation of endoderm in human pluripotent stem cells. A record of this paper's transparent peer review process is included in the Supplemental Information.

Keywords:  EpiMap; H3K27me3; TRIAGE; cell differentiation; computational method; epigenetic; pluripotent stem cell; predictions; single cell RNA-seq

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cels.2020.11.001
Genes Dev. 2020 Dec 10.

Pioneer-like factor GAF cooperates with PBAP (SWI/SNF) and NURF (ISWI) to regulate transcription.

Julius Judd, Fabiana M Duarte, John T Lis.

  Transcriptionally silent genes must be activated throughout development. This requires nucleosomes be removed from promoters and enhancers to allow transcription factor (TF) binding and recruitment of coactivators and RNA polymerase II (Pol II). Specialized pioneer TFs bind nucleosome-wrapped DNA to perform this chromatin opening by mechanisms that remain incompletely understood. Here, we show that GAGA factor (GAF), a Drosophila pioneer-like factor, functions with both SWI/SNF and ISWI family chromatin remodelers to allow recruitment of Pol II and entry to a promoter-proximal paused state, and also to promote Pol II's transition to productive elongation. We found that GAF interacts with PBAP (SWI/SNF) to open chromatin and allow Pol II to be recruited. Importantly, this activity is not dependent on NURF as previously proposed; however, GAF also synergizes with NURF downstream from this process to ensure efficient Pol II pause release and transition to productive elongation, apparently through its role in precisely positioning the +1 nucleosome. These results demonstrate how a single sequence-specific pioneer TF can synergize with remodelers to activate sets of genes. Furthermore, this behavior of remodelers is consistent with findings in yeast and mice, and likely represents general, conserved mechanisms found throughout eukarya.

Keywords:  chromatin remodelers; pioneer factors; promoter-proximal pausing; transcription regulation

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1101/gad.341768.120
Nature. 2020 Dec 09.

H1 histones control the epigenetic landscape by local chromatin compaction.

Michael A Willcockson, Sean E Healton, Cary N Weiss, Boris A Bartholdy, Yair Botbol, Laxmi N Mishra, Dhruv S Sidhwani, Tommy J Wilson, Hugo B Pinto, Maxim I Maron, Karin A Skalina, Laura Norwood Toro, Jie Zhao, Chul-Hwan Lee, Harry Hou, Nevin Yusufova, Cem Meydan, Adewola Osunsade, Yael David, Ethel Cesarman, Ari M Melnick, Simone Sidoli, Benjamin A Garcia, Winfried Edelmann, Fernando Macian, Arthur I Skoultchi.

H1 linker histones are the most abundant chromatin-binding proteins1. In vitro studies indicate that their association with chromatin determines nucleosome spacing and enables arrays of nucleosomes to fold into more compact chromatin structures. However, the in vivo roles of H1 are poorly understood2. Here we show that the local density of H1 controls the balance of repressive and active chromatin domains by promoting genomic compaction. We generated a conditional triple-H1-knockout mouse strain and depleted H1 in haematopoietic cells. H1 depletion in T cells leads to de-repression of T cell activation genes, a process that mimics normal T cell activation. Comparison of chromatin structure in normal and H1-depleted CD8+ T cells reveals that H1-mediated chromatin compaction occurs primarily in regions of the genome containing higher than average levels of H1: the chromosome conformation capture (Hi-C) B compartment and regions of the Hi-C A compartment marked by PRC2. Reduction of H1 stoichiometry leads to decreased H3K27 methylation, increased H3K36 methylation, B-to-A-compartment shifting and an increase in interaction frequency between compartments. In vitro, H1 promotes PRC2-mediated H3K27 methylation and inhibits NSD2-mediated H3K36 methylation. Mechanistically, H1 mediates these opposite effects by promoting physical compaction of the chromatin substrate. Our results establish H1 as a critical regulator of gene silencing through localized control of chromatin compaction, 3D genome organization and the epigenetic landscape.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-020-3032-z
Mol Cell. 2020 Dec 01. pii: S1097-2765(20)30793-0. [Epub ahead of print]

Molecular Co-occupancy Identifies Transcription Factor Binding Cooperativity In Vivo.

Can Sönmezer, Rozemarijn Kleinendorst, Dilek Imanci, Guido Barzaghi, Laura Villacorta, Dirk Schübeler, Vladimir Benes, Nacho Molina, Arnaud Regis Krebs.

  Gene activation requires the cooperative activity of multiple transcription factors at cis-regulatory elements (CREs). Yet, most transcription factors have short residence time, questioning the requirement of their physical co-occupancy on DNA to achieve cooperativity. Here, we present a DNA footprinting method that detects individual molecular interactions of transcription factors and nucleosomes with DNA in vivo. We apply this strategy to quantify the simultaneous binding of multiple transcription factors on single DNA molecules at mouse CREs. Analysis of the binary occupancy patterns at thousands of motif combinations reveals that high DNA co-occupancy occurs for most types of transcription factors, in the absence of direct physical interaction, at sites of competition with nucleosomes. Perturbation of pairwise interactions demonstrates the function of molecular co-occupancy in binding cooperativity. Our results reveal the interactions regulating CREs at molecular resolution and identify DNA co-occupancy as a widespread cooperativity mechanism used by transcription factors to remodel chromatin.

Keywords:  chromatin; enhancers; gene regulation; genomics; transcription factor cooperativity

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.molcel.2020.11.015
Genome Biol. 2020 Dec 08. 21(1): 296

Simultaneous epigenetic perturbation and genome imaging reveal distinct roles of H3K9me3 in chromatin architecture and transcription.

Ying Feng, Yao Wang, Xiangnan Wang, Xiaohui He, Chen Yang, Ardalan Naseri, Thoru Pederson, Jing Zheng, Shaojie Zhang, Xiao Xiao, Wei Xie, Hanhui Ma.

INTRODUCTION: Despite the long-observed correlation between H3K9me3, chromatin architecture, and transcriptional repression, how H3K9me3 regulates genome higher-order organization and transcriptional activity in living cells remains unclear.
RESULT: Here, we develop EpiGo (Epigenetic perturbation induced Genome organization)-KRAB to introduce H3K9me3 at hundreds of loci spanning megabases on human chromosome 19 and simultaneously track genome organization. EpiGo-KRAB is sufficient to induce genomic clustering and de novo heterochromatin-like domain formation, which requires SETDB1, a methyltransferase of H3K9me3. Unexpectedly, EpiGo-KRAB-induced heterochromatin-like domain does not result in widespread gene repression except a small set of genes with concurrent loss of H3K4me3 and H3K27ac. Ectopic H3K9me3 appears to spread in inactive regions but is largely restricted from transcriptional initiation sites in active regions. Finally, Hi-C analysis showed that EpiGo-KRAB reshapes existing compartments mainly at compartment boundaries.
CONCLUSIONS: These results reveal the role of H3K9me3 in genome organization could be partially separated from its function in gene repression.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s13059-020-02201-1
Nature. 2020 Dec 09.

Histone H1 loss drives lymphoma by disrupting 3D chromatin architecture.

Nevin Yusufova, Andreas Kloetgen, Matt Teater, Adewola Osunsade, Jeannie M Camarillo, Christopher R Chin, Ashley S Doane, Bryan J Venters, Stephanie Portillo-Ledesma, Joseph Conway, Jude M Phillip, Olivier Elemento, David W Scott, Wendy Béguelin, Jonathan D Licht, Neil L Kelleher, Louis M Staudt, Arthur I Skoultchi, Michael-Christopher Keogh, Effie Apostolou, Christopher E Mason, Marcin Imielinski, Tamar Schlick, Yael David, Aristotelis Tsirigos, C David Allis, Alexey A Soshnev, Ethel Cesarman, Ari M Melnick.

Linker histone H1 proteins bind to nucleosomes and facilitate chromatin compaction1, although their biological functions are poorly understood. Mutations in the genes that encode H1 isoforms B-E (H1B, H1C, H1D and H1E; also known as H1-5, H1-2, H1-3 and H1-4, respectively) are highly recurrent in B cell lymphomas, but the pathogenic relevance of these mutations to cancer and the mechanisms that are involved are unknown. Here we show that lymphoma-associated H1 alleles are genetic driver mutations in lymphomas. Disruption of H1 function results in a profound architectural remodelling of the genome, which is characterized by large-scale yet focal shifts of chromatin from a compacted to a relaxed state. This decompaction drives distinct changes in epigenetic states, primarily owing to a gain of histone H3 dimethylation at lysine 36 (H3K36me2) and/or loss of repressive H3 trimethylation at lysine 27 (H3K27me3). These changes unlock the expression of stem cell genes that are normally silenced during early development. In mice, loss of H1c and H1e (also known as H1f2 and H1f4, respectively) conferred germinal centre B cells with enhanced fitness and self-renewal properties, ultimately leading to aggressive lymphomas with an increased repopulating potential. Collectively, our data indicate that H1 proteins are normally required to sequester early developmental genes into architecturally inaccessible genomic compartments. We also establish H1 as a bona fide tumour suppressor and show that mutations in H1 drive malignant transformation primarily through three-dimensional genome reorganization, which leads to epigenetic reprogramming and derepression of developmentally silenced genes.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-020-3017-y
Genes Dev. 2020 Dec 10.

Argonaute NRDE-3 and MBT domain protein LIN-61 redundantly recruit an H3K9me3 HMT to prevent embryonic lethality and transposon expression.

Jan Padeken, Stephen Methot, Peter Zeller, Colin E Delaney, Veronique Kalck, Susan M Gasser.

  The establishment and maintenance of chromatin domains shape the epigenetic memory of a cell, with the methylation of histone H3 lysine 9 (H3K9me) defining transcriptionally silent heterochromatin. We show here that the C. elegans SET-25 (SUV39/G9a) histone methyltransferase (HMT), which catalyzes H3K9me1, me2 and me3, can establish repressed chromatin domains de novo, unlike the SETDB1 homolog MET-2. Thus, SET-25 is needed to silence novel insertions of RNA or DNA transposons, and repress tissue-specific genes de novo during development. We identify two partially redundant pathways that recruit SET-25 to its targets. One pathway requires LIN-61 (L3MBTL2), which uses its four MBT domains to bind the H3K9me2 deposited by MET-2. The second pathway functions independently of MET-2 and involves the somatic Argonaute NRDE-3 and small RNAs. This pathway targets primarily highly conserved RNA and DNA transposons. These redundant SET-25 targeting pathways (MET-2-LIN-61-SET-25 and NRDE-3-SET-25) ensure repression of intact transposons and de novo insertions, while MET-2 can act alone to repress simple and satellite repeats. Removal of both pathways in the met-2;nrde-3 double mutant leads to the loss of somatic H3K9me2 and me3 and the synergistic derepression of transposons in embryos, strongly elevating embryonic lethality.

Keywords:  Argonaute; HMT; LIN-61; MBT domain proteins; MET-2; NRDE-3; SET-25; heterochromatin; histone methyl transferases (HMTs); transposon silencing

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1101/gad.344234.120
Mol Cell. 2020 Nov 27. pii: S1097-2765(20)30788-7. [Epub ahead of print]

A Role for the Mre11-Rad50-Xrs2 Complex in Gene Expression and Chromosome Organization.

Romain Forey, Antoine Barthe, Mireille Tittel-Elmer, Maxime Wery, Marie-Bénédicte Barrault, Cécile Ducrot, Andrew Seeber, Nils Krietenstein, Ugo Szachnowski, Magdalena Skrzypczak, Krzysztof Ginalski, Maga Rowicka, Jennifer A Cobb, Oliver J Rando, Julie Soutourina, Michel Werner, Karine Dubrana, Susan M Gasser, Antonin Morillon, Philippe Pasero, Armelle Lengronne, Jérôme Poli.

  Mre11-Rad50-Xrs2 (MRX) is a highly conserved complex with key roles in various aspects of DNA repair. Here, we report a new function for MRX in limiting transcription in budding yeast. We show that MRX interacts physically and colocalizes on chromatin with the transcriptional co-regulator Mediator. MRX restricts transcription of coding and noncoding DNA by a mechanism that does not require the nuclease activity of Mre11. MRX is required to tether transcriptionally active loci to the nuclear pore complex (NPC), and it also promotes large-scale gene-NPC interactions. Moreover, MRX-mediated chromatin anchoring to the NPC contributes to chromosome folding and helps to control gene expression. Together, these findings indicate that MRX has a role in transcription and chromosome organization that is distinct from its known function in DNA repair.

Keywords:  MRX/N; Mediator; SMC complexes; chromosomal interaction domains; chromosome folding; chromosome organization; coding and non-coding transcription control; nuclear pore

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.molcel.2020.11.010
Nucleic Acids Res. 2020 Dec 08. pii: gkaa1168. [Epub ahead of print]

Flanking sequence preference modulates de novo DNA methylation in the mouse genome.

Izaskun Mallona, Ioana Mariuca Ilie, Ino Dominiek Karemaker, Stefan Butz, Massimiliano Manzo, Amedeo Caflisch, Tuncay Baubec.

Mammalian de novo DNA methyltransferases (DNMT) are responsible for the establishment of cell-type-specific DNA methylation in healthy and diseased tissues. Through genome-wide analysis of de novo methylation activity in murine stem cells we uncover that DNMT3A prefers to methylate CpGs followed by cytosines or thymines, while DNMT3B predominantly methylates CpGs followed by guanines or adenines. These signatures are further observed at non-CpG sites, resembling methylation context observed in specialised cell types, including neurons and oocytes. We further show that these preferences result from structural differences in the catalytic domains of the two de novo DNMTs and are not a consequence of differential recruitment to the genome. Molecular dynamics simulations suggest that, in case of human DNMT3A, the preference is due to favourable polar interactions between the flexible Arg836 side chain and the guanine that base-pairs with the cytosine following the CpG. By exchanging arginine to a lysine, the corresponding side chain in DNMT3B, the sequence preference is reversed, confirming the requirement for arginine at this position. This context-dependent enzymatic activity provides additional insights into the complex regulation of DNA methylation patterns.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/nar/gkaa1168
PLoS Genet. 2020 Dec 07. 16(12): e1009226

CAF-1 and Rtt101p function within the replication-coupled chromatin assembly network to promote H4 K16ac, preventing ectopic silencing.

Tiffany J Young, Yi Cui, Claire Pfeffer, Emilie Hobbs, Wenjie Liu, Joseph Irudayaraj, Ann L Kirchmaier.

Replication-coupled chromatin assembly is achieved by a network of alternate pathways containing different chromatin assembly factors and histone-modifying enzymes that coordinate deposition of nucleosomes at the replication fork. Here we describe the organization of a CAF-1-dependent pathway in Saccharomyces cerevisiae that regulates acetylation of histone H4 K16. We demonstrate factors that function in this CAF-1-dependent pathway are important for preventing establishment of silenced states at inappropriate genomic sites using a crippled HMR locus as a model, while factors specific to other assembly pathways do not. This CAF-1-dependent pathway required the cullin Rtt101p, but was functionally distinct from an alternate pathway involving Rtt101p-dependent ubiquitination of histone H3 and the chromatin assembly factor Rtt106p. A major implication from this work is that cells have the inherent ability to create different chromatin modification patterns during DNA replication via differential processing and deposition of histones by distinct chromatin assembly pathways within the network.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pgen.1009226
Cell Syst. 2020 Dec 03. pii: S2405-4712(20)30454-3. [Epub ahead of print]

H4K20 Methylation Is Differently Regulated by Dilution and Demethylation in Proliferating and Cell-Cycle-Arrested Xenopus Embryos.

Lea Schuh, Carolin Loos, Daniil Pokrovsky, Axel Imhof, Ralph A W Rupp, Carsten Marr.

  DNA replication during cell division leads to dilution of histone modifications and can thus affect chromatin-mediated gene regulation, raising the question of how the cell-cycle shapes the histone modification landscape, particularly during embryogenesis. We tackled this problem by manipulating the cell cycle during early Xenopus laevis embryogenesis and analyzing in vivo histone H4K20 methylation kinetics. The global distribution of un-, mono-, di-, and tri-methylated histone H4K20 was measured by mass spectrometry in normal and cell-cycle-arrested embryos over time. Using multi-start maximum likelihood optimization and quantitative model selection, we found that three specific biological methylation rate constants were required to explain the measured H4K20 methylation state kinetics. While demethylation is essential for regulating H4K20 methylation kinetics in non-cycling cells, demethylation is very likely dispensable in rapidly dividing cells of early embryos, suggesting that cell-cycle-mediated dilution of H4K20 methylation is an essential regulatory component for shaping its epigenetic landscape during early development. A record of this paper's transparent peer review process is included in the Supplemental Information.

Keywords:  Xenopus laevis; computational modeling; demethylation; development; epigenetics; histone post-translational modifications; methylation kinetics; ordinary differential equations

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cels.2020.11.003
Cell Rep. 2020 Dec 08. pii: S2211-1247(20)31462-5. [Epub ahead of print]33(10): 108473

Epigenomic Reprogramming toward Mesenchymal-Epithelial Transition in Ovarian-Cancer-Associated Mesenchymal Stem Cells Drives Metastasis.

Huihui Fan, Huda I Atiya, Yeh Wang, Thomas R Pisanic, Tza-Huei Wang, Ie-Ming Shih, Kelly K Foy, Leonard Frisbie, Ronald J Buckanovich, Alison A Chomiak, Rochelle L Tiedemann, Scott B Rothbart, Chelsea Chandler, Hui Shen, Lan G Coffman.

  A role for cancer cell epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT) in cancer is well established. Here, we show that, in addition to cancer cell EMT, ovarian cancer cell metastasis relies on an epigenomic mesenchymal-to-epithelial transition (MET) in host mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs). These reprogrammed MSCs, termed carcinoma-associated MSCs (CA-MSCs), acquire pro-tumorigenic functions and directly bind cancer cells to serve as a metastatic driver/chaperone. Cancer cells induce this epigenomic MET characterized by enhancer-enriched DNA hypermethylation, altered chromatin accessibility, and differential histone modifications. This phenomenon appears clinically relevant, as CA-MSC MET is highly correlated with patient survival. Mechanistically, mirroring MET observed in development, MET in CA-MSCs is mediated by WT1 and EZH2. Importantly, EZH2 inhibitors, which are clinically available, significantly inhibited CA-MSC-mediated metastasis in mouse models of ovarian cancer.

Keywords:  EZH2; WT1; carcinoma-associated mesenchymal stem cells; epigenomic reprogramming; mesenchymal-to-epithelial transition; metastasis; ovarian cancer; tumor microenvironment

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.celrep.2020.108473
Stem Cell Reports. 2020 Dec 08. pii: S2213-6711(20)30453-7. [Epub ahead of print]15(6): 1246-1259

TINC- A Method to Dissect Regulatory Complexes at Single-Locus Resolution- Reveals an Extensive Protein Complex at the Nanog Promoter.

Anja S Knaupp, Monika Mohenska, Michael R Larcombe, Ethan Ford, Sue Mei Lim, Kayla Wong, Joseph Chen, Jaber Firas, Cheng Huang, Xiaodong Liu, Trung Nguyen, Yu B Y Sun, Melissa L Holmes, Pratibha Tripathi, Jahnvi Pflueger, Fernando J Rossello, Jan Schröder, Kathryn C Davidson, Christian M Nefzger, Partha P Das, Jody J Haigh, Ryan Lister, Ralf B Schittenhelm, Jose M Polo.

  Cellular identity is ultimately dictated by the interaction of transcription factors with regulatory elements (REs) to control gene expression. Advances in epigenome profiling techniques have significantly increased our understanding of cell-specific utilization of REs. However, it remains difficult to dissect the majority of factors that interact with these REs due to the lack of appropriate techniques. Therefore, we developed TINC: TALE-mediated isolation of nuclear chromatin. Using this new method, we interrogated the protein complex formed at the Nanog promoter in embryonic stem cells (ESCs) and identified many known and previously unknown interactors, including RCOR2. Further interrogation of the role of RCOR2 in ESCs revealed its involvement in the repression of lineage genes and the fine-tuning of pluripotency genes. Consequently, using the Nanog promoter as a paradigm, we demonstrated the power of TINC to provide insight into the molecular makeup of specific transcriptional complexes at individual REs as well as into cellular identity control in general.

Keywords:  Epigenetics; Nanog; RCOR2; TINC; iPSCs; pluripotency; reprogramming; single-locus pull-down; transcriptional complex

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.stemcr.2020.11.005
Cell Death Differ. 2020 Dec 10.

Kdm6a suppresses the alternative activation of macrophages and impairs energy expenditure in obesity.

Jun Chen, Xing Xu, Yan Li, Fan Li, Jianjun Zhang, Qin Xu, Wantao Chen, Yan Wei, Xu Wang.

Histone lysine demethylase 6a (Kdm6a) mediates the removal of repressive trimethylation from histone H3 lysine 27 (H3K27me3) to activate target gene expression. Obesity is associated with metabolic inflammation, and adipose tissue macrophages (ATMs) are key players orchestrating metabolic inflammation. However, it is still unclear whether the Kdm6a pathway in ATMs regulates energy homeostasis. Here, we identified Kdm6a as a critical epigenetic switch that modulates macrophage polarisation and further disrupts energy balance. Myeloid-specific Kdm6a knockout in Kdm6aF/Y;Lyz2-Cre mice significantly reversed the high-fat diet (HFD)-induced M1-M2 imbalance in white adipose tissue (WAT) and blocked HFD-induced obesity. The brown adipose tissue (BAT) activity, WAT browning and energy expenditure were significantly increased in Kdm6aF/Y;Lyz2-Cre mice. Furthermore, Kdm6a regulated the Ire1α expression in a demethylase activity-dependent manner and augmented the M2 polarisation of macrophages. Macrophage with higher Kdm6a significantly promotes adipogenesis in white adipocyte and inhibits thermogenesis in beige adipocytes. These results suggest that the Kdm6a in macrophages drives obesity and metabolic syndrome by impairing BAT activity and WAT differentiation.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41418-020-00694-8
Sci Adv. 2020 Dec;pii: eabe8159. [Epub ahead of print]6(50):

The Hippo pathway coactivator Yorkie can reprogram cell fates and create compartment-boundary-like interactions at clone margins.

Joanna C D Bairzin, Maya Emmons-Bell, Iswar K Hariharan.

During development, tissue-specific patterns of gene expression are established by transcription factors and then stably maintained via epigenetic mechanisms. Cancer cells often express genes that are inappropriate for that tissue or developmental stage. Here, we show that high activity levels of Yki, the Hippo pathway coactivator that causes overgrowth in Drosophila imaginal discs, can also disrupt cell fates by altering expression of selector genes like engrailed (en) and Ultrabithorax (Ubx). Posterior clones expressing activated Yki can down-regulate en and express an anterior selector gene, cubitus interruptus (ci). The microRNA bantam and the chromatin regulator Taranis both function downstream of Yki in promoting ci expression. The boundary between Yki-expressing posterior clones and surrounding wild-type cells acquires properties reminiscent of the anteroposterior compartment boundary; Hedgehog signaling pathway activation results in production of Dpp. Thus, at least in principle, heterotypic interactions between Yki-expressing cells and their neighbors could activate boundary-specific signaling mechanisms.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abe8159
Endocrinology. 2020 Dec 08. pii: bqaa226. [Epub ahead of print]

A Positive Feedback Loop Between TGFβ and Androgen Receptor Supports Triple-Negative Breast Cancer Anoikis Resistance.

Emmanuel Rosas, Justin T Roberts, Kathleen O'Neill, Jessica L Christenson, Michelle M Williams, Toru Hanamura, Nicole S Spoelstra, Jeffery M Vahrenkamp, Jason Gertz, Jennifer K Richer.

  Triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) is an aggressive subtype with peak recurrence as metastatic disease within the first few years of diagnosis. Androgen receptor (AR) expression is increased in anchorage independent cells in TNBC pre-clinical models. Both AR knockdown and inhibition lead to reduced TNBC invasion in vitro, reduced tumorigenicity and less recurrence in vivo in pre-clinical models. Transforming growth factor β (TGFβ) pathway gene signatures also increased during anchorage independent survival both in vitro and in vivo in pre-clinical models and in circulating tumor cells (CTC) from patients during emergence of chemo resistant disease. We hypothesized that a positive loop between AR and TGFβ signaling facilitates TNBC anchorage independent survival. We find that multiple components of the TGFβ pathway, including TGFβ1 and 3, as well as pathway activity measured by nuclear localization and transcriptional activity of phosphorylated Smad3 (pSmad3), are enhanced in anchorage independent conditions. Further, exogenous TGFβ increased AR protein while TGFβ inhibition decreased AR and TNBC viability, particularly under anchorage independent culture conditions. ChIP-seq experiments revealed AR binding to TGFB1 and SMAD3 regulatory regions in MDA-MB-453 cells. In clinical datasets, TGFB3 and AR positively correlate and high expression of both genes together corresponded to significantly worse recurrence-free and overall survival in both ER negative and basal-like breast cancer. Finally, inhibiting both AR and TGFβ decreased cell survival, particularly under anchorage independent conditions. These findings warrant further investigations into whether combined inhibition of AR and TGFβ pathways might decrease metastatic recurrence rates and mortality from TNBC.

Keywords:  Androgen receptor; Anoikis resistance; Enzalutamide; LY2109761; LY2157299; TGFβ; Triple negative breast cancer

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1210/endocr/bqaa226
Mol Cell. 2020 Dec 01. pii: S1097-2765(20)30784-X. [Epub ahead of print]

ZNF410 Uniquely Activates the NuRD Component CHD4 to Silence Fetal Hemoglobin Expression.

Xianjiang Lan, Ren Ren, Ruopeng Feng, Lana C Ly, Yemin Lan, Zhe Zhang, Nicholas Aboreden, Kunhua Qin, John R Horton, Jeremy D Grevet, Thiyagaraj Mayuranathan, Osheiza Abdulmalik, Cheryl A Keller, Belinda Giardine, Ross C Hardison, Merlin Crossley, Mitchell J Weiss, Xiaodong Cheng, Junwei Shi, Gerd A Blobel.

  Metazoan transcription factors typically regulate large numbers of genes. Here we identify via a CRISPR-Cas9 genetic screen ZNF410, a pentadactyl DNA-binding protein that in human erythroid cells directly activates only a single gene, the NuRD component CHD4. Specificity is conveyed by two highly evolutionarily conserved clusters of ZNF410 binding sites near the CHD4 gene with no counterparts elsewhere in the genome. Loss of ZNF410 in adult-type human erythroid cell culture systems and xenotransplantation settings diminishes CHD4 levels and derepresses the fetal hemoglobin genes. While previously known to be silenced by CHD4, the fetal globin genes are exposed here as among the most sensitive to reduced CHD4 levels.. In vitro DNA binding assays and crystallographic studies reveal the ZNF410-DNA binding mode. ZNF410 is a remarkably selective transcriptional activator in erythroid cells, and its perturbation might offer new opportunities for treatment of hemoglobinopathies.

Keywords:  CHD4; CRISPR screen; NuRD; ZNF410; erythroid biology; fetal hemoglobin; hemoglobin switching; sickle cell disease; transcription; transcription factor

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.molcel.2020.11.006
Nat Commun. 2020 12 08. 11(1): 6297

Pontin arginine methylation by CARM1 is crucial for epigenetic regulation of autophagy.

Young Suk Yu, Hijai R Shin, Dongha Kim, Seon Ah Baek, Seon Ah Choi, Hyejin Ahn, Amen Shamim, Jeonghwan Kim, Ik Soo Kim, Kyeong Kyu Kim, Kyoung-Jae Won, Sung Hee Baek.

Autophagy is a catabolic process through which cytoplasmic components are degraded and recycled in response to various stresses including starvation. Recently, transcriptional and epigenetic regulations of autophagy have emerged as essential mechanisms for maintaining homeostasis. Here, we identify that coactivator-associated arginine methyltransferase 1 (CARM1) methylates Pontin chromatin-remodeling factor under glucose starvation, and methylated Pontin binds Forkhead Box O 3a (FOXO3a). Genome-wide analyses and biochemical studies reveal that methylated Pontin functions as a platform for recruiting Tip60 histone acetyltransferase with increased H4 acetylation and subsequent activation of autophagy genes regulated by FOXO3a. Surprisingly, CARM1-Pontin-FOXO3a signaling axis can work in the distal regions and activate autophagy genes through enhancer activation. Together, our findings provide a signaling axis of CARM1-Pontin-FOXO3a and further expand the role of CARM1 in nuclear regulation of autophagy.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-20080-9
Nat Commun. 2020 12 08. 11(1): 6269

An epigenetic gene silencing pathway selectively acting on transgenic DNA in the green alga Chlamydomonas.

Juliane Neupert, Sean D Gallaher, Yinghong Lu, Daniela Strenkert, Na'ama Segal, Rouhollah Barahimipour, Sorel T Fitz-Gibbon, Michael Schroda, Sabeeha S Merchant, Ralph Bock.

Silencing of exogenous DNA can make transgene expression very inefficient. Genetic screens in the model alga Chlamydomonas have demonstrated that transgene silencing can be overcome by mutations in unknown gene(s), thus producing algal strains that stably express foreign genes to high levels. Here, we show that the silencing mechanism specifically acts on transgenic DNA. Once a permissive chromatin structure has assembled, transgene expression can persist even in the absence of mutations disrupting the silencing pathway. We have identified the gene conferring the silencing and show it to encode a sirtuin-type histone deacetylase. Loss of gene function does not appreciably affect endogenous gene expression. Our data suggest that transgenic DNA is recognized and then quickly inactivated by the assembly of a repressive chromatin structure composed of deacetylated histones. We propose that this mechanism may have evolved to provide protection from potentially harmful types of environmental DNA.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-19983-4
Dev Cell. 2020 Dec 01. pii: S1534-5807(20)30886-8. [Epub ahead of print]

Single-Cell Sequencing of Developing Human Gut Reveals Transcriptional Links to Childhood Crohn's Disease.

Rasa Elmentaite, Alexander D B Ross, Kenny Roberts, Kylie R James, Daniel Ortmann, Tomás Gomes, Komal Nayak, Liz Tuck, Sophie Pritchard, Omer Ali Bayraktar, Robert Heuschkel, Ludovic Vallier, Sarah A Teichmann, Matthias Zilbauer.

  Human gut development requires the orchestrated interaction of differentiating cell types. Here, we generate an in-depth single-cell map of the developing human intestine at 6-10 weeks post-conception. Our analysis reveals the transcriptional profile of cycling epithelial precursor cells; distinct from LGR5-expressing cells. We propose that these cells may contribute to differentiated cell subsets via the generation of LGR5-expressing stem cells and receive signals from surrounding mesenchymal cells. Furthermore, we draw parallels between the transcriptomes of ex vivo tissues and in vitro fetal organoids, revealing the maturation of organoid cultures in a dish. Lastly, we compare scRNA-seq profiles from pediatric Crohn's disease epithelium alongside matched healthy controls to reveal disease-associated changes in the epithelial composition. Contrasting these with the fetal profiles reveals the re-activation of fetal transcription factors in Crohn's disease. Our study provides a resource available at www.gutcellatlas.org, and underscores the importance of unraveling fetal development in understanding disease.

Keywords:  human fetal gut development; inflammatory bowel disease; intestinal organoids; intestinal stem cells; pediatric Crohn's disease; single-cell RNA sequencing; villus formation

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.devcel.2020.11.010
Mol Syst Biol. 2020 10;16(10): e9885

Genome-wide off-rates reveal how DNA binding dynamics shape transcription factor function.

Wim J de Jonge, Mariël Brok, Philip Lijnzaad, Patrick Kemmeren, Frank Cp Holstege.

  Protein-DNA interactions are dynamic, and these dynamics are an important aspect of chromatin-associated processes such as transcription or replication. Due to a lack of methods to study on- and off-rates across entire genomes, protein-DNA interaction dynamics have not been studied extensively. Here, we determine in vivo off-rates for the Saccharomyces cerevisiae chromatin organizing factor Abf1, at 191 sites simultaneously across the yeast genome. Average Abf1 residence times span a wide range, varying between 4.2 and 33 min. Sites with different off-rates are associated with different functional characteristics. This includes their transcriptional dependency on Abf1, nucleosome positioning and the size of the nucleosome-free region, as well as the ability to roadblock RNA polymerase II for termination. The results show how off-rates contribute to transcription factor function and that DIVORSEQ (Determining In Vivo Off-Rates by SEQuencing) is a meaningful way of investigating protein-DNA binding dynamics genome-wide.

Keywords:  DNA binding dynamics; epigenetics; genomics; systems biology; transcription

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.15252/msb.20209885
Elife. 2020 Dec 07. pii: e59388. [Epub ahead of print]9

Gene regulation gravitates towards either addition or multiplication when combining the effects of two signals.

Eric M Sanford, Benjamin L Emert, Allison Coté, Arjun Raj.

  Two different cell signals often affect transcription of the same gene. In such cases, it is natural to ask how the combined transcriptional response compares to the individual responses. The most commonly used mechanistic models predict additive or multiplicative combined responses, but a systematic genome-wide evaluation of these predictions is not available. Here, we analyzed the transcriptional response of human MCF-7 cells to retinoic acid and TGF-β, applied individually and in combination. The combined transcriptional responses of induced genes exhibited a range of behaviors, but clearly favored both additive and multiplicative outcomes. We performed paired chromatin accessibility measurements and found that increases in accessibility were largely additive. There was some association between super-additivity of accessibility and multiplicative or super-multiplicative combined transcriptional responses, while sub-additivity of accessibility associated with additive transcriptional responses. Our findings suggest that mechanistic models of combined transcriptional regulation must be able to reproduce a range of behaviors.

Keywords:  chromosomes; computational biology; gene expression; human; systems biology

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.59388
Genome Biol. 2020 Dec 08. 21(1): 298

STARRPeaker: uniform processing and accurate identification of STARR-seq active regions.

Donghoon Lee, Manman Shi, Jennifer Moran, Martha Wall, Jing Zhang, Jason Liu, Dominic Fitzgerald, Yasuhiro Kyono, Lijia Ma, Kevin P White, Mark Gerstein.

STARR-seq technology has employed progressively more complex genomic libraries and increased sequencing depths. An issue with the increased complexity and depth is that the coverage in STARR-seq experiments is non-uniform, overdispersed, and often confounded by sequencing biases, such as GC content. Furthermore, STARR-seq readout is confounded by RNA secondary structure and thermodynamic stability. To address these potential confounders, we developed a negative binomial regression framework for uniformly processing STARR-seq data, called STARRPeaker. Moreover, to aid our effort, we generated whole-genome STARR-seq data from the HepG2 and K562 human cell lines and applied STARRPeaker to comprehensively and unbiasedly call enhancers in them.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/s13059-020-02194-x
Nucleic Acids Res. 2020 Dec 08. pii: gkaa1130. [Epub ahead of print]

Histone benzoylation serves as an epigenetic mark for DPF and YEATS family proteins.

Xiangle Ren, Yang Zhou, Zhaoyu Xue, Ning Hao, Yuanyuan Li, Xiaohuan Guo, Daliang Wang, Xiaobing Shi, Haitao Li.

Histone modifications and their functional readout serve as an important mechanism for gene regulation. Lysine benzoylation (Kbz) on histones is a recently identified acylation mark associated with active transcription. However, it remains to be explored whether putative readers exist to recognize this epigenetic mark. Here, our systematic binding studies demonstrated that the DPF and YEATS, but not the Bromodomain family members, are readers for histone Kbz. Co-crystal structural analyses revealed a 'hydrophobic encapsulation' and a 'tip-sensor' mechanism for Kbz readout by DPF and YEATS, respectively. Moreover, the DPF and YEATS family members display subtle yet unique features to create somewhat flexible engagements of different acylation marks. For instance, YEATS2 but not the other YEATS proteins exhibits best preference for Kbz than lysine acetylation and crotonylation due to its wider 'tip-sensor' pocket. The levels of histone benzoylation in cultured cells or in mice are upregulated upon sodium benzoate treatment, highlighting its dynamic regulation. In summary, our work identifies the first readers for histone Kbz and reveals the molecular basis underlying Kbz recognition, thus paving the way for further functional dissections of histone benzoylation.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/nar/gkaa1130
Cell Rep. 2020 Dec 08. pii: S2211-1247(20)31463-7. [Epub ahead of print]33(10): 108474

The Master Regulator Protein BAZ2B Can Reprogram Human Hematopoietic Lineage-Committed Progenitors into a Multipotent State.

Karthik Arumugam, William Shin, Valentina Schiavone, Lukas Vlahos, Xiaochuan Tu, Davide Carnevali, Jordan Kesner, Evan O Paull, Neus Romo, Prem Subramaniam, Jeremy Worley, Xiangtian Tan, Andrea Califano, Maria Pia Cosma.

  Bi-species, fusion-mediated, somatic cell reprogramming allows precise, organism-specific tracking of unknown lineage drivers. The fusion of Tcf7l1-/- murine embryonic stem cells with EBV-transformed human B cell lymphocytes, leads to the generation of bi-species heterokaryons. Human mRNA transcript profiling at multiple time points permits the tracking of the reprogramming of B cell nuclei to a multipotent state. Interrogation of a human B cell regulatory network with gene expression signatures identifies 8 candidate master regulator proteins. Of these 8 candidates, ectopic expression of BAZ2B, from the bromodomain family, efficiently reprograms hematopoietic committed progenitors into a multipotent state and significantly enhances their long-term clonogenicity, stemness, and engraftment in immunocompromised mice. Unbiased systems biology approaches let us identify the early driving events of human B cell reprogramming.

Keywords:  BAZ2B; cell fusion; chromatin remodeling; gene regulatory network; hematopoietic stem cells; master regulators; reprogramming; single cell sequencing; systems biology

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.celrep.2020.108474
Cell Metab. 2020 Dec 01. pii: S1550-4131(20)30606-9. [Epub ahead of print]

The Nuclear Receptor ESRRA Protects from Kidney Disease by Coupling Metabolism and Differentiation.

Poonam Dhillon, Jihwan Park, Carmen Hurtado Del Pozo, Lingzhi Li, Tomohito Doke, Shizheng Huang, Juanjuan Zhao, Hyun Mi Kang, Rojesh Shrestra, Michael S Balzer, Shatakshee Chatterjee, Patricia Prado, Seung Yub Han, Hongbo Liu, Xin Sheng, Pieterjan Dierickx, Kirill Batmanov, Juan P Romero, Felipe Prósper, Mingyao Li, Liming Pei, Junhyong Kim, Nuria Montserrat, Katalin Susztak.

  Kidney disease is poorly understood because of the organ's cellular diversity. We used single-cell RNA sequencing not only in resolving differences in injured kidney tissue cellular composition but also in cell-type-specific gene expression in mouse models of kidney disease. This analysis highlighted major changes in cellular diversity in kidney disease, which markedly impacted whole-kidney transcriptomics outputs. Cell-type-specific differential expression analysis identified proximal tubule (PT) cells as the key vulnerable cell type. Through unbiased cell trajectory analyses, we show that PT cell differentiation is altered in kidney disease. Metabolism (fatty acid oxidation and oxidative phosphorylation) in PT cells showed the strongest and most reproducible association with PT cell differentiation and disease. Coupling of cell differentiation and the metabolism was established by nuclear receptors (estrogen-related receptor alpha [ESRRA] and peroxisomal proliferation-activated receptor alpha [PPARA]) that directly control metabolic and PT-cell-specific gene expression in mice and patient samples while protecting from kidney disease in the mouse model.

Keywords:  ESRRA; PPARA; chronic kidney disease; fatty-acid oxidation; fibrosis; kidney; organoids; proximal tubule cells; single-cell ATAC sequencing; single-cell RNA sequencing

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cmet.2020.11.011
Mol Cell. 2020 Nov 25. pii: S1097-2765(20)30794-2. [Epub ahead of print]

Cryo-EM Structures Reveal Transcription Initiation Steps by Yeast Mitochondrial RNA Polymerase.

Brent De Wijngaert, Shemaila Sultana, Anupam Singh, Chhaya Dharia, Hans Vanbuel, Jiayu Shen, Daniel Vasilchuk, Sergio E Martinez, Eaazhisai Kandiah, Smita S Patel, Kalyan Das.

  Mitochondrial RNA polymerase (mtRNAP) is crucial in cellular energy production, yet understanding of mitochondrial DNA transcription initiation lags that of bacterial and nuclear DNA transcription. We report structures of two transcription initiation intermediate states of yeast mtRNAP that explain promoter melting, template alignment, DNA scrunching, abortive synthesis, and transition into elongation. In the partially melted initiation complex (PmIC), transcription factor MTF1 makes base-specific interactions with flipped non-template (NT) nucleotides "AAGT" at -4 to -1 positions of the DNA promoter. In the initiation complex (IC), the template in the expanded 7-mer bubble positions the RNA and NTP analog UTPαS, while NT scrunches into an NT loop. The scrunched NT loop is stabilized by the centrally positioned MTF1 C-tail. The IC and PmIC states coexist in solution, revealing a dynamic equilibrium between two functional states. Frequent scrunching/unscruching transitions and the imminent steric clashes of the inflating NT loop and growing RNA:DNA with the C-tail explain abortive synthesis and transition into elongation.

Keywords:  MTF1; POLRMT; RNA polymerase; RNAP; RPO41; TFB2M; mitochondria; transcription factor

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.molcel.2020.11.016
Genome Res. 2020 Dec 10. pii: gr.267310.120. [Epub ahead of print]

Evidence of widespread, independent sequence signature for transcription factor cobinding.

Manqi Zhou, Hongyang Li, Xueqing Wang, Yuanfang Guan.

Transcription factors (TFs) are the vocabulary that genomes use to regulate gene expression and phenotypes. The interactions among TFs enrich this vocabulary and orchestrate diverse biological processes. While simple models identify open chromatin and the presence of TF motifs as the two major contributors to TF binding patterns, it remains elusive what contributes to the in vivo TF cobinding landscape. In this study, we developed a machine learning algorithm to explore the contributors of the cobinding patterns. The algorithm substantially outperforms the state-of-the-field models for TF cobinding prediction. Game theory-based feature importance analysis reveals that, for most of the TF pairs we studied, independent motif sequences contribute more than at least one of the two TFs under investigation to their cobinding patterns. Such independent motif sequences include, but are not limited to, transcription initiation-related proteins and known TF complexes. We found the motif sequence signatures and the TFs are rarely mutual, corroborating a hierarchical and directional organization of the regulatory network and refuting the possibility of artifacts caused by shared sequence similarity with the TFs under investigation. We modeled such regulatory language with directed graphs, which reveal shared, global factors that are related to many binding and cobinding patterns.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1101/gr.267310.120
Genome Res. 2020 Dec 10. pii: gr.263491.120. [Epub ahead of print]

Epigenomic differences in the human and chimpanzee genomes are associated with structural variation.

Xiaoyu Zhuo, Alan Y Du, Erica C Pehrsson, Daofeng Li, Ting Wang.

Structural variation (SV), including insertions and deletions (indels), is a primary mechanism of genome evolution. However, the mechanism by which SV contributes to epigenome evolution is poorly understood. In this study, we characterized the association between lineage-specific indels and epigenome differences between human and chimpanzee to investigate how SVs might have shaped the epigenetic landscape. By intersecting medium-to-large human-chimpanzee indels (20bp-50kb) with putative promoters and enhancers in cranial neural crest cells (CNCC) and repressed regions in induced pluripotent cells (iPSC), we found that ~12% indels overlap putative regulatory and repressed regions (RRRs), and 15% of these indels are associated with lineage-biased RRRs. Indel-associated putative enhancer and repressive regions are ~1.3 and ~3 times as likely to be lineage-biased, respectively, as those not associated with indels. We found a 2-fold enrichment of medium-sized indels (20bp to 50bp) in CpG island (CGI)-containing promoters than expected by chance. Lastly, from human-specific transposable element insertions, we identified putative regulatory elements, including NR2F1-bound putative CNCC enhancers derived from SVAs and putative iPSC promoters derived from LTR5s. Our results demonstrate that different types of indels are associated with specific epigenomic diversity between human and chimpanzee.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1101/gr.263491.120
Commun Biol. 2020 Dec 07. 3(1): 740

Epigenetic landscape of pancreatic neuroendocrine tumours reveals distinct cells of origin and means of tumour progression.

Annunziata Di Domenico, Christodoulos P Pipinikas, Renaud S Maire, Konstantin Bräutigam, Cedric Simillion, Matthias S Dettmer, Erik Vassella, Chrissie Thirlwell, Aurel Perren, Ilaria Marinoni.

Recent data suggest that Pancreatic Neuroendocrine Tumours (PanNETs) originate from α- or β-cells of the islets of Langerhans. The majority of PanNETs are non-functional and do not express cell-type specific hormones. In the current study we examine whether tumour DNA methylation (DNAme) profiling combined with genomic data is able to identify cell of origin and to reveal pathways involved in PanNET progression. We analyse genome-wide DNAme data of 125 PanNETs and sorted α- and β-cells. To confirm cell identity, we investigate ARX and PDX1 expression. Based on epigenetic similarities, PanNETs cluster in α-like, β-like and intermediate tumours. The epigenetic similarity to α-cells progressively decreases in the intermediate tumours, which present unclear differentiation. Specific transcription factor methylation and expression vary in the respective α/β-tumour groups. Depending on DNAme similarity to α/β-cells, PanNETs have different mutational spectra, stage of the disease and prognosis, indicating potential means of PanNET progression.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s42003-020-01479-y
Aging (Albany NY). 2020 Dec 03. 12

Enhancer-bound Nrf2 licenses HIF-1α transcription under hypoxia to promote cisplatin resistance in hepatocellular carcinoma cells.

Xin Jin, Liansheng Gong, Ying Peng, Le Li, Gang Liu.

  Tumor microenvironment is hypoxic, which can cause resistance to chemotherapy, but the detailed mechanisms remain elusive. Here we find that mild hypoxia (5% O2) further increases cisplatin resistance in the already resistant HepG2/DDP but not the sensitive HepG2 cells. We find that Nrf2 is responsible for cisplatin resistance under hypoxia, as Nrf2 knockdown sensitizes HepG2/DDP cells while Nrf2 hyper-activation (though KEAP1 knockdown) increases resistance of HepG2 cells to cisplatin. Nrf2 binds to an enhancer element in the upstream of HIF-1α gene independently of hypoxia, promoting HIF-1α mRNA synthesis under hypoxic condition. As a result, Nrf2-dependent transcription counteracts HIF-1α degradation under mild hypoxia condition, leading to preferential cisplatin-resistance in HepG2/DDP cells. Our data suggest that Nrf2 regulation of HIF-1α could be an important mechanism for chemotherapy resistance in vivo.

Keywords:  HIF-1α; Nrf2; chemoresistance; hypoxia; tumor microenvironment

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.202137
Cell Rep. 2020 Dec 08. pii: S2211-1247(20)31479-0. [Epub ahead of print]33(10): 108490

Nuclear cGAS Functions Non-canonically to Enhance Antiviral Immunity via Recruiting Methyltransferase Prmt5.

Shufang Cui, Qiuya Yu, Lei Chu, Ye Cui, Ming Ding, Quanyi Wang, Hongyun Wang, Yu Chen, Xing Liu, Chen Wang.

  Cyclic guanosine monophosphate (GMP)-AMP synthase (cGAS), upon sensing cytosolic DNA, catalyzes the production of cyclic guanosine monophosphate-adenosine monophosphate (cGAMP), which activates STING-TBK1-IRF3 signaling. cGAS is also present in the nucleus, but the relevant nuclear function or mechanism remains largely unknown. Here, we report that nuclear cGAS is indispensable for inducing cytokines and chemokines triggered by RNA/DNA viruses. Unexpectedly, the DNA-binding/nucleotidyltransferase activity of cGAS is dispensable for RNA-virus-induced genes expression. cGAS deficiency does not affect the phosphorylation, dimerization, or nuclear translocation of IRF3 induced by double-stranded RNA (dsRNA). Mechanistically, nuclear-localized cGAS interacts with protein arginine methyltransferase 5 (Prmt5), which catalyzes the symmetric dimethylation of histone H3 arginine 2 at Ifnb and Ifna4 promoters, thus facilitating the access of IRF3. Deficiency of Prmt5 or disrupting its catalytic activity suppresses the production of type I interferons (IFNs), impairing the host defenses against RNA/DNA virus infections. Taken together, our study uncovers a non-canonical function of nuclear-localized cGAS in innate immunity via regulating histone arginine modification.

Keywords:  DNA virus; Prmt5; RNA virus; histone dimethylation; innate immunity; nuclear cGAS

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.celrep.2020.108490