Nucleosome in Biological News

UC San Diego engineer provides insights to decades-old DNA squabble

... heteromorphic chromatin fibers from analysis of nucleosome interactions." The authors include Gaurav Arya, a ... that chromatin has a zigzag structure where the nucleosome chain follows a zigzag path along the chromatin ... fiber such that the linker DNA is straight. (The nucleosome is the basic unit of chromatin that consists of ...

Scripps Research scientists shed light on how DNA is unwound so that its code can be read

... first found that it holds an individual nucleosome in what looks like a vise grip. They then found ... in the DNA that can be propagated around the nucleosome and make possible translocation of the DNA with ... The researchers believe that by translocating a nucleosome along the DNA, RSC eventually slides into the ...

Media highlights in the January issues of Biophysical Journal

... The ability of the DNA sequence itself to contribute significantly to nucleosome stability and DNA accessibility provides a mechanism for differential ... such as those on key promoter elements. Significant sequence-dependence nucleosome stability is not widely-recognized but is potentially of fundamental ...

Researchers 'unzip' molecules to measure interactions keeping DNA packed in cells

... understand what happens during that unwrapping process is at the heart of this research team's efforts. By unzipping each DNA double helix through a nucleosome using an optical trap -- a technique developed in Wang's lab -- they unwrapped strands of DNA from their histone cores, observing, with near-base ...

Scientists map key landmarks in human genome

... study presents the first global view of human nucleosome positioning," said Fisher. Although analyses of ... computational data analysis to pin down the nucleosome locations. The paper describes how the scientists ... than in the DNA regions that are tied up by the nucleosome complexes. These results suggest ...

Scientists reveal structure of gateways to gene control

... intimate relationship between the architecture of nucleosome structures and the underlying DNA sequences they ... sequences are part of the control-center's H2A.Z nucleosome for each gene in the yeast genome. Also for the ... tend to be located on the outside edge of the nucleosome and tend to face outward on the DNA helix, ...

Scientists discover a genetic code for organizing DNA within the nucleus

... nucleus. What determines how, when and where a nucleosome will be positioned along the DNA sequence? Dr. ... to day function, since access to DNA wrapped in a nucleosome is blocked for many proteins, including those ... of the DNA is packaged into nucleosomes. A single nucleosome contains about 150 genetic bases (the "letters" ...

UCR chemist part of team identifying new areas of gene regulation

... near the entry-exit points of the DNA superhelix as it wraps around the nucleosome is required for recruiting the nucleosome remodeling complex SWI/SNF and so regulates gene activity," he said. ...

DNA repair proteins monitored at double-strand break

... nucleosomes—the compact packages formed when strands of DNA wind around proteins, called histones, like thread around a spool. Disruption of the nucleosome at the site of a double-strand break allows the DNA to unravel and expose the area to repair proteins; the loss of functioning ATM and NBS1 blocks ...

Latent memory of cells comes to life

... specific DNA region. Changes can also happen during the lifetime of a cell due to chemical reactions allowing interconversions between the different nucleosome types. The effect of these changes can be that a latent capacity that was dormant comes to life, or, conversely, that a previously active capacity ...

Penn researcher shows that DNA gets kinky easily at the nanoscale

... shouldn't spontaneously bend into such tight structures, yet it does," Nelson said. "In the conventional view of a DNA molecule, wrapping DNA into a nucleosome would be like bending a yardstick around a baseball." To study DNA on the needed short length scales, Nelson and his colleagues used a technique ...