histone h3.3 variant dynamics in the germline of caenorhabditis elegans组蛋白h3.3变体动力学生殖系的线虫.pdfVIP

Histone H3.3 Variant Dynamics in the Germline of Caenorhabditis elegans 1 1,2 1,2* Siew Loon Ooi , James R. Priess , Steven Henikoff 1 Division of Basic Sciences, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, Washington, United States of America, 2 Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, Washington, United States of America Germline chromatin undergoes dramatic remodeling events involving histone variants during the life cycle of an organism. A universal histone variant, H3.3, is incorporated at sites of active transcription throughout the cell cycle. The presence of H3.3 in chromatin indicates histone turnover, which is the energy-dependent removal of preexisting histones and replacement with new histones. H3.3 is also incorporated during decondensation of the Drosophila sperm pronucleus, indicating a direct role in chromatin remodeling upon fertilization. Here we present a system to monitor histone turnover and chromatin remodeling during Caenorhabditis elegans development by following the developmental dynamics of H3.3. We generated worm strains expressing green fluorescent protein– or yellow fluorescent protein–fused histone H3.3 proteins, HIS-71 and HIS-72. We found that H3.3 is retained in mature sperm chromatin, raising the possibility that it transmits epigenetic information via the male germline. Upon fertilization, maternal H3.3 enters both male and female pronuclei and is incorporated into paternal chromatin, apparently before the onset of embryonic transcription, suggesting that H3.3 can be incorporated independent of transcription. In early embryos, H3.3 becomes specifically depleted from primordial germ cells. Strikingly, the X chromosome becomes deficient in H3.3 during gametogenesis, i