Heterochromatin tells CENP-A where to go.

Mickaël Durand-Dubief, Karl Ekwall

Journal: BioEssays : news and reviews in molecular, cellular and developmental biology 2008;30(6):526-9

PMID: 18478529

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Abstract

The centromere is the region of the chromosome where the kinetochore forms. Kinetochores are the attachment sites for spindle microtubules that separate duplicated chromosomes in mitosis and meiosis. Kinetochore formation depends on a special chromatin structure containing the histone H3 variant CENP-A. The epigenetic mechanisms that maintain CENP-A chromatin throughout the cell cycle have been studied extensively but little is known about the mechanism that targets CENP-A to naked centromeric DNA templates. In a recent report published in Science, such de novo centromere assembly of CENP-A is shown to be dependent on heterochromatin and the RNA interference pathway.

Address: Karolinska Institutet, Department of Biosciences and Medical Nutrition/School of Life Sciences, University College Sodertorn, Sweden.

DOI: 10.1002/bies.20763

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MeSH Terms: Centromere, Chromatin Assembly and Disassembly, Chromosomal Proteins, Non-Histone, DNA, Fungal, Heterochromatin, Histones, Models, Biological, RNA Interference, Schizosaccharomyces, Schizosaccharomyces pombe Proteins, Transformation, Genetic