TY - JOUR
T1 - Left-handedly curved DNA regulates accessibility to cis-DNA elements in chromatin
AU - Nishikawa, Jun Ichi
AU - Amano, Miho
AU - Fukue, Yoshiro
AU - Tanaka, Shigeo
AU - Kishi, Haruka
AU - Hirota, Yoshiko
AU - Yoda, Kinya
AU - Ohyama, Takashi
N1 - Funding Information:
We wish to thank Y. Kadokawa for the plasmid pEKS, T. Yoshioka, J. Kishida and T. Kawashima for technical assistance, and J. Ohyama for help in preparing the manuscript. This work was supported in part by a Grant-in-Aid from the Ministry of Education, Science, Sports and Culture of Japan, NIG Cooperative Research Program and the Hirao Taro Foundation for Academic Research (to T.O.).
PY - 2003/11/15
Y1 - 2003/11/15
N2 - There is little information on chromatin structure that allows access of trans-acting transcription factors. Logically, the target DNA elements become accessible by either exposing themselves towards the environment on the surface of the nucleosome, or making the regulatory region free of the nucleosome. Here, we demonstrate that curved DNA that mimics a negative supercoil can play both roles in the promoter region. By constructing 35 reporter plasmids and using in vivo assay systems, we scrutinized the relationships between upstream DNA geometry, nucleosome positioning and promoter activity. When the left-handedly curved DNA was linked to the herpes simplex virus thymidine kinase (HSV tk) promoter at a specific rotational phase and distance, the curved DNA attracted the nucleosome and the TATA box was thereby left in the linker DNA with its minor groove facing outwards, which led to the activation of transcription. Neither planar curving, nor right-handedly curved DNA nor straight DNA had this effect. Our results seem to provide a clue for solving the problem of why curved DNA is often located near transcriptional control regions.
AB - There is little information on chromatin structure that allows access of trans-acting transcription factors. Logically, the target DNA elements become accessible by either exposing themselves towards the environment on the surface of the nucleosome, or making the regulatory region free of the nucleosome. Here, we demonstrate that curved DNA that mimics a negative supercoil can play both roles in the promoter region. By constructing 35 reporter plasmids and using in vivo assay systems, we scrutinized the relationships between upstream DNA geometry, nucleosome positioning and promoter activity. When the left-handedly curved DNA was linked to the herpes simplex virus thymidine kinase (HSV tk) promoter at a specific rotational phase and distance, the curved DNA attracted the nucleosome and the TATA box was thereby left in the linker DNA with its minor groove facing outwards, which led to the activation of transcription. Neither planar curving, nor right-handedly curved DNA nor straight DNA had this effect. Our results seem to provide a clue for solving the problem of why curved DNA is often located near transcriptional control regions.
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U2 - 10.1093/nar/gkg854
DO - 10.1093/nar/gkg854
M3 - Article
C2 - 14602926
AN - SCOPUS:0345099609
SN - 0305-1048
VL - 31
SP - 6651
EP - 6662
JO - Nucleic Acids Research
JF - Nucleic Acids Research
IS - 22
ER -