Open AccessControl of Meiotic Recombination and Gene Expression in Yeast by a Simple Repetitive DNA Sequence That Excludes Nucleosomes
Author(s) -
David T. Kirkpatrick,
Yuh Hwa Wang,
Margaret Dominska,
Jack D. Griffith,
Thomas D. Petes
Publication year - 1999
Publication title -
molecular and cellular biology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.14
H-Index - 327
eISSN - 1067-8824
pISSN - 0270-7306
DOI - 10.1128/mcb.19.11.7661
Subject(s) - biology , genetics , nucleosome , gene , homologous recombination , dna , sequence (biology) , flp frt recombination , recombination , genetic recombination , histone
Tandem repeats of the pentanucleotide 5′-CCGNN (where N indicates any base) were previously shown to exclude nucleosomes in vitro (Y.-H. Wang and J. D. Griffith, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 93:8863–8867, 1996). To determine the in vivo effects of these sequences, we replaced the upstream regulatory sequences of theHIS4 gene ofSaccharomyces cerevisiae with either 12 or 48 tandem copies of CCGNN. Both tracts activatedHIS4 transcription. We found that (CCGNN)12 tracts elevated meiotic recombination (hot spot activity), whereas the (CCGNN)48 tract repressed recombination (cold spot activity). In addition, a “pure” tract of (CCGAT)12 activated both transcription and meiotic recombination. We suggest that the cold spot activity of the (CCGNN)48 tract is related to the phenomenon of the suppressive interactions of adjacent hot spots previously described in yeast (Q.-Q. Fan, F. Xu, and T. D. Petes, Mol. Cell. Biol. 15:1679–1688, 1995; Q.-Q. Fan, F. Xu, M. A. White, and T. D. Petes, Genetics 145:661–670, 1997; T.-C. Wu and M. Lichten, Genetics 140:55–66, 1995; L. Xu and N. Kleckner, EMBO J. 16:5115–5128, 1995).