TY - JOUR
T1 - Repeat Organization and Epigenetic Regulation of the DH-Cμ Domain of the Immunoglobulin Heavy-Chain Gene Locus
AU - Chakraborty, Tirtha
AU - Chowdhury, Dipanjan
AU - Keyes, Amanda
AU - Jani, Anant
AU - Subrahmanyam, Ramesh
AU - Ivanova, Irina
AU - Sen, Ranjan
PY - 2007/9/7
Y1 - 2007/9/7
N2 - The first steps of murine immunoglobulin heavy-chain (IgH) gene recombination take place within a chromosomal domain that contains diversity (DH) and joining (JH) gene segments, but not variable (VH) gene segments. Here we show that the chromatin state of this domain is markedly heterogeneous. Specifically, only 5′- and 3′-most DH gene segments carry active chromatin modifications, whereas intervening DHs are associated with heterochromatic marks that are maintained by ongoing histone deacetylation. The intervening DHs form part of a tandemly repeated sequence that expresses tissue-specific, antisense oriented transcripts. We propose that the intervening DH genes are actively suppressed by repeat-induced epigenetic silencing, which is reflected in their infrequent representation in DJH junctions compared to the flanking DH genes.
AB - The first steps of murine immunoglobulin heavy-chain (IgH) gene recombination take place within a chromosomal domain that contains diversity (DH) and joining (JH) gene segments, but not variable (VH) gene segments. Here we show that the chromatin state of this domain is markedly heterogeneous. Specifically, only 5′- and 3′-most DH gene segments carry active chromatin modifications, whereas intervening DHs are associated with heterochromatic marks that are maintained by ongoing histone deacetylation. The intervening DHs form part of a tandemly repeated sequence that expresses tissue-specific, antisense oriented transcripts. We propose that the intervening DH genes are actively suppressed by repeat-induced epigenetic silencing, which is reflected in their infrequent representation in DJH junctions compared to the flanking DH genes.
KW - DNA
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=34548247115&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=34548247115&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.molcel.2007.07.010
DO - 10.1016/j.molcel.2007.07.010
M3 - Article
C2 - 17803947
AN - SCOPUS:34548247115
SN - 1097-2765
VL - 27
SP - 842
EP - 850
JO - Molecular Cell
JF - Molecular Cell
IS - 5
ER -