Person:

Struhl, Kevin

Background: Iwr1, a protein conserved throughout eukaryotes, was originally identified by its physical interaction with RNA polymerase (Pol) II. Principal Findings: Here, we identify Iwr1 in a genetic screen designed to uncover proteins involved in Pol III transcription in (S. cerevisiae). Iwr1 is important for Pol III transcription, because an (iwr1) mutant strain shows reduced association of TBP and Pol III at Pol III promoters, a decreased rate of Pol III transcription, and lower steady-state levels of Pol III transcripts. Interestingly, an (iwr1) mutant strain also displays reduced association of TBP to Pol I-transcribed genes and of both TBP and Pol II to Pol II-transcribed promoters. Despite this, rRNA and mRNA levels are virtually unaffected, suggesting a post-transcriptional mechanism compensating for the occupancy defect. Conclusions: Thus, Iwr1 plays an important role in preinitiation complex formation by all three nuclear RNA polymerases.

Background: High density oligonucleotide tiling arrays are an effective and powerful platform for conducting unbiased genome-wide studies. The ab initio probe selection method employed in tiling arrays is unbiased, and thus ensures consistent sampling across coding and non-coding regions of the genome. Tiling arrays are increasingly used in chromatin immunoprecipitation (IP) experiments (ChIP on chip). ChIP on chip facilitates the generation of genome-wide maps of in-vivo interactions between DNA-associated proteins including transcription factors and DNA. Analysis of the hybridization of an immunoprecipitated sample to a tiling array facilitates the identification of ChIP-enriched segments of the genome. These enriched segments are putative targets of antibody assayable regulatory elements. The enrichment response is not ubiquitous across the genome. Typically 5 to 10% of tiled probes manifest some significant enrichment. Depending upon the factor being studied, this response can drop to less than 1%. The detection and assessment of significance for interactions that emanate from non-canonical and/or un-annotated regions of the genome is especially challenging. This is the motivation behind the proposed algorithm. Results: We have proposed a novel rank and replicate statistics-based methodology for identifying and ascribing statistical confidence to regions of ChIP-enrichment. The algorithm is optimized for identification of sites that manifest low levels of enrichment but are true positives, as validated by alternative biochemical experiments. Although the method is described here in the context of ChIP on chip experiments, it can be generalized to any treatment-control experimental design. The results of the algorithm show a high degree of concordance with independent biochemical validation methods. The sensitivity and specificity of the algorithm have been characterized via quantitative PCR and independent computational approaches. Conclusion: The algorithm ranks all enrichment sites based on their intra-replicate ranks and inter-replicate rank consistency. Following the ranking, the method allows segmentation of sites based on a meta p-value, a composite array signal enrichment criterion, or a composite of these two measures. The sensitivities obtained subsequent to the segmentation of data using a meta p-value of 10-5, an array signal enrichment of 0.2 and a composite of these two values are 88%, 87% and 95%, respectively.

The PPARγ nuclear receptor pathway is involved in cancer, but it appears to have both tumor suppressor and oncogenic functions. In neuroblastoma cells, miR-27b targets the 3′UTR of PPARγ and inhibits its mRNA and protein expression. miR-27b overexpression or PPARγ inhibition blocks cell growth in vitro and tumor growth in mouse xenografts. PPARγ activates expression of the pH regulator NHE1, which is associated with tumor progression. Lastly, miR-27b through PPARγ regulates NF-κB activity and transcription of inflammatory target genes. Thus, in neuroblastoma, miR-27b functions as a tumor suppressor by inhibiting the tumor-promoting function of PPARγ, which triggers an increased inflammatory response. In contrast, in breast cancer cells, PPARγ inhibits NHE1 expression and the inflammatory response, and it functions as a tumor suppressor. We suggest that the ability of PPARγ to promote or suppress tumor formation is linked to cell-type specific differences in regulation of NHE1 and other target genes.

Sirtuin proteins regulate diverse cellular pathways that influence genomic stability, metabolism, and ageing. SIRT7 is a mammalian sirtuin whose biochemical activity, molecular targets, and physiologic functions have been unclear. Here we show that SIRT7 is an NAD(^+)-dependent H3K18Ac (acetylated lysine 18 of histone H3) deacetylase that stabilizes the transformed state of cancer cells. Genome-wide binding studies reveal that SIRT7 binds to promoters of a specific set of gene targets, where it deacetylates H3K18Ac and promotes transcriptional repression. The spectrum of SIRT7 target genes is defined in part by its interaction with the cancer-associated ETS transcription factor ELK4, and comprises numerous genes with links to tumour suppression. Notably, selective hypoacetylation of H3K18Ac has been linked to oncogenic transformation, and in patients is associated with aggressive tumour phenotypes and poor prognosis. We find that deacetylation of H3K18Ac by SIRT7 is necessary for maintaining essential features of human cancer cells, including anchorage-independent growth and escape from contact inhibition. Moreover, SIRT7 is necessary for a global hypoacetylation of H3K18Ac associated with cellular transformation by the viral oncoprotein E1A. Finally, SIRT7 depletion markedly reduces the tumourigenicity of human cancer cell xenografts in mice. Together, our work establishes SIRT7 as a highly selective H3K18Ac deacetylase and demonstrates a pivotal role for SIRT7 in chromatin regulation, cellular transformation programs, and tumour formation in vivo.

In colorectal cancer cells, a non-epigenetic transcriptional pathway that is mediated by an oncogene maintains DNA methylation of tumour suppressor genes

Long non-coding RNAs (lncRNAs) have been implicated in normal cellular homeostasis as well as pathophysiological conditions, including cancer. Here we performed global gene expression profiling of mammary epithelial cells transformed by oncogenic v-Src, and identified a large subset of uncharacterized lncRNAs potentially involved in breast cancer development. Specifically, our analysis revealed a novel lncRNA, LINC00520 that is upregulated upon ectopic expression of oncogenic v-Src, in a manner that is dependent on the transcription factor STAT3. Similarly, LINC00520 is also increased in mammary epithelial cells transformed by oncogenic PI3K and its expression is decreased upon knockdown of mutant PIK3CA. Additional expression profiling highlight that LINC00520 is elevated in a subset of human breast carcinomas, with preferential enrichment in the basal-like molecular subtype. ShRNA-mediated depletion of LINC00520 results in decreased cell migration and loss of invasive structures in 3D. RNA sequencing analysis uncovers several genes that are differentially expressed upon ectopic expression of LINC00520, a significant subset of which are also induced in v-Src-transformed MCF10A cells. Together, these findings characterize LINC00520 as a lncRNA that is regulated by oncogenic Src, PIK3CA and STAT3, and which may contribute to the molecular etiology of breast cancer.

Extensive sonication of formaldehyde-crosslinked chromatin can generate DNA fragments averaging 200 bp in length (range 75–300 bp). Fragmentation is largely random with respect to genomic region and nucleosome position. ChIP experiments employing such extensively fragmented samples show 2- to 4-fold increased enrichment of protein binding sites over control genomic regions, when compared to samples sonicated to a more conventional size range (300–500 bp). The basis of improved fold enrichments is that immunoprecipitation of protein-bound regions is unaffected by fragment size, whereas immunoprecipitation of control genomic regions decreases progressively along with reduced fragment size due to fewer nonspecific binding sites. The use of extensively sonicated samples improves mapping of protein binding sites, and it extends the dynamic range for quantitative measurements of histone density. We show that many yeast promoter regions are virtually devoid of histones.

Background: High density oligonucleotide tiling arrays are an effective and powerful platform for conducting unbiased genome-wide studies. The ab initio probe selection method employed in tiling arrays is unbiased, and thus ensures consistent sampling across coding and non-coding regions of the genome. These arrays are being increasingly used to study the associated processes of transcription, transcription factor binding, chromatin structure and their association. Studies of differential expression and/or regulation provide critical insight into the mechanics of transcription and regulation that occurs during the developmental program of a cell. The time-course experiment, which comprises an in-vivo system and the proposed analyses, is used to determine if annotated and un-annotated portions of genome manifest coordinated differential response to the induced developmental program. Results: We have proposed a novel approach, based on a piece-wise function – to analyze genome-wide differential response. This enables segmentation of the response based on protein-coding and non-coding regions; for genes the methodology also partitions differential response with a 5' versus 3' versus intra-genic bias. Conclusion: The algorithm built upon the framework of Significance Analysis of Microarrays, uses a generalized logic to define regions/patterns of coordinated differential change. By not adhering to the gene-centric paradigm, discordant differential expression patterns between exons and introns have been identified at a FDR of less than 12 percent. A co-localization of differential binding between RNA Polymerase II and tetra-acetylated histone has been quantified at a p-value < 0.003 it is most significant at the 5' end of genes, at a p-value < 10^{-13}. The prototype R code has been made available as supplementary material [see Additional file 1].

Ribosome profiling is widely used to study translation in vivo, but not all sequence reads correspond to ribosome-protected RNA. Here, we develop Rfoot, a computational pipeline that analyzes ribosomal profiling data and identifies native, non-ribosomal RNA-protein complexes in the same sample.. We use Rfoot to precisely map RNase-protected regions within small nucleolar RNAs, spliceosomal RNAs, microRNAs, tRNAs, long noncoding (lnc) RNAs, and 3’ˊ untranslated regions of mRNAs in human cells. We show that RNAs of the same class can show differential complex association. Although only a subset of lncRNAs show RNase footprints, many of these have multiple footprints, and the protected regions are evolutionarily conserved, suggestive of biological functions.

Using a new bioinformatic method to analyze ribosome profiling data, we show that 40% of lncRNAs and pseudogene RNAs expressed in human cells are translated. In addition, ~35% of mRNA coding genes are translated upstream of the primary protein-coding region (uORFs) and 4% are translated downstream (dORFs). Translated lncRNAs preferentially localize in the cytoplasm, whereas untranslated lncRNAs preferentially localize in the nucleus. The translation efficiency of cytoplasmic lncRNAs is nearly comparable to that of mRNAs, suggesting that cytoplasmic lncRNAs are engaged by the ribosome and translated. While most peptides generated from lncRNAs may be highly unstable byproducts without function, ~9% of the peptides are conserved in ORFs in mouse transcripts, as are 74% of pseudogene peptides, 24% of uORF peptides and 32% of dORF peptides. Analyses of synonymous and nonsynonymous substitution rates of these conserved peptides show that some are under stabilizing selection, suggesting potential functional importance. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.08890.001