Packaging of DNA into nucleosomes and the formation of higher-order chromatin structures determine DNA accessibility and activity of genome domains. We identified an RNA-dependent mechanism maintaining the open chromatin structure within euchromatic regions in Drosophila cells. The mechanism of reversible chromatin opening, reconstituted in vitro, depends on the Drosophila decondensation factor 31 (Df31) that specifically binds to RNA and localizes to euchromatic regions. Df31 is capable to tether a heterogeneous pool of short, single-stranded RNAs to chromatin. This class of chromatin-associated RNA (caRNA) is stably linked to chromatin and is largely composed of snoRNAs, which are preferentially bound by Df31. We suggest that the Df31-mediated linkage of snoRNAs and chromatin, forms a RNA-chromatin network resulting in the establishment of open chromatin domains. Analysis of caRNAs in human cells also reveals a strong enrichment of snoRNAs, implying a conserved role for these molecules in higher-order structures of chromatin.

Mammalian telomeres stabilize chromosome ends as a result of their assembly into a peculiar form of chromatin comprising a complex of non-histone proteins named shelterin. TRF2, one of the shelterin components, binds to the duplex part of telomeric DNA and is essential to fold the telomeric chromatin into a protective cap. Although most of the human telomeric DNA is organized into tightly spaced nucleosomes, their role in telomere protection and how they interplay with telomere-specific factors in telomere organization is still unclear. In this study we investigated whether TRF2 can regulate nucleosome assembly at telomeres.By means of chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) and Micrococcal Nuclease (MNase) mapping assay, we found that the density of telomeric nucleosomes in human cells was inversely proportional to the dosage of TRF2 at telomeres. This effect was not observed in the G1 phase of the cell cycle but appeared coincident of late or post-replicative events. Moreover, we showed that TRF2 overexpression altered nucleosome spacing at telomeres increasing internucleosomal distance. By means of an in vitro nucleosome assembly system containing purified histones and remodeling factors, we reproduced the short nucleosome spacing found in telomeric chromatin. Importantly, when in vitro assembly was performed in the presence of purified TRF2, nucleosome spacing on a telomeric DNA template increased, in agreement with in vivo MNase mapping.Our results demonstrate that TRF2 negatively regulates the number of nucleosomes at human telomeres by a cell cycle-dependent mechanism that alters internucleosomal distance. These findings raise the intriguing possibility that telomere protection is mediated, at least in part, by the TRF2-dependent regulation of nucleosome organization.

The ends of eukaryotic chromosomes need to be protected from the activation of a DNA damage response that leads the cell to replicative senescence or apoptosis. In mammals, protection is accomplished by a six-factor complex named shelterin, which organizes the terminal TTAGGG repeats in a still ill-defined structure, the telomere. The stable interaction of shelterin with telomeres mainly depends on the binding of two of its components, TRF1 and TRF2, to double-stranded telomeric repeats. Tethering of TRF proteins to telomeres occurs in a chromatin environment characterized by a very compact nucleosomal organization. In this work we show that binding of TRF1 and TRF2 to telomeric sequences is modulated by the histone octamer. By means of in vitro models, we found that TRF2 binding is strongly hampered by the presence of telomeric nucleosomes, whereas TRF1 binds efficiently to telomeric DNA in a nucleosomal context and is able to remodel telomeric nucleosomal arrays. Our results indicate that the different behavior of TRF proteins partly depends on the interaction with histone tails of their divergent N-terminal domains. We propose that the interplay between the histone octamer and TRF proteins plays a role in the steps leading to telomere deprotection.

The structure of chromatin is critical for many aspects of cellular physiology and is considered to be the primary medium to store epigenetic information. It is defined by the histone molecules that constitute the nucleosome, the positioning of the nucleosomes along the DNA and the non-histone proteins that associate with it. These factors help to establish and maintain a largely DNA sequenceindependent but surprisingly stable structure. Chromatin is extensively disassembled and reassembled during DNA replication, repair, recombination or transcription in order to allow the necessary factors to gain access to their substrate. Despite such constant interference with chromatin structure, the epigenetic information is generally well maintained. Surprisingly, the mechanisms that coordinate chromatin assembly and ensure proper assembly are not particularly well understood. Here, we use label free quantitative mass spectrometry to describe the kinetics of in vitro assembled chromatin supported by an embryo extract prepared from preblastoderm Drosophila melanogaster embryos. The use of a data independent acquisition method for proteome wide quantitation allows a time resolved comparison of in vitro chromatin assembly. A comparison of our in vitro data with proteomic studies of replicative chromatin assembly in vivo reveals an extensive overlap showing that the in vitro system can be used for investigating the kinetics of chromatin assembly in a proteome-wide manner. DNA replication, transcription and repair continuously disturb the conformation of chromatin, which results in a relatively high rate of histone turnover (1) and poses a constant threat to the maintenance of epigenetic information (2, 3). Therefore, chromatin assembly has to be controlled thoroughly to ensure a proper chromatin structure. It is well appreciated that chromatin assembly is a highly regulated multistep process involving synthesis, storage and nuclear transport of histones followed by their deposition onto DNA. Immediately after translation and before the assembly onto DNA, histones are bound by a number of chaperones that assist their folding, posttranslational modification, nuclear transport and prevent nonspecific association with negatively charged cellular molecules (4 -6). Once histones are deposited, chromatin adopts a particular conformation containing specific histone modification patterns (7-9) and a defined composition of associated proteins (10 -13). Crosslinking experiments show that histones H3 and H4 are first deposited as a tetramer, whereas two dimers of H2A and H2B are added at a subsequent stage (14,15). A similar assembly pathway is also observed in an in vitro assembly system where the process of histone deposition and chromatin contraction occurs within 30 s (16,17). Regardless of this apparent rapid compaction, it takes much longer for new chromatin to become indistinguishable from the bulk chromatin in vivo (9, 13).Recent systematic studies revealed that mature chromatin adopts a complex molecular structure containing a ...

Here, we use LC–MS/MS and SWATH-MS to describe the kinetics of in vitro assembled chromatin supported by an embryo extract prepared from preblastoderm Drosophila melanogaster embryos (DREX). This system allows easy manipulation of distinct aspects of chromatin assembly such as post-translational histone modifications, the levels of histone chaperones and the concentration of distinct DNA binding factors. In total, 480 proteins have been quantified as chromatin enriched factors and their binding kinetics have been monitored in the time course of 15 min, 1 h and 4 h of chromatin assembly.The data accompanying the manuscript on this approach, Völker-Albert et al., 2016 “A quantitative proteomic analysis of in vitro assembled chromatin” [1], has been deposited to the ProteomeXchange Consortium (http://www.proteomexchange.org) via the PRIDE partner repository with the dataset identifier submission number PRIDE: PXD002537 and PRIDE: PXD003445.