Polycomb Recruiters Inside and Outside of the Repressed Domains

Abstract

The establishment and stable inheritance of individual patterns of gene expression in different cell types are required for the development of multicellular organisms. The important epigenetic regulators are the Polycomb group (PcG) and Trithorax group (TrxG) proteins, which control the silenced and active states of genes, respectively. In Drosophila, the PcG/TrxG group proteins are recruited to the DNA regulatory sequences termed the Polycomb response elements (PREs). The PREs are composed of the binding sites for different DNA-binding proteins, the so-called PcG recruiters. Currently, the role of the PcG recruiters in the targeting of the PcG proteins to PREs is well documented. However, there are examples where the PcG recruiters are also implicated in the active transcription and in the TrxG function. In addition, there is increasing evidence that the genome-wide PcG recruiters interact with the chromatin outside of the PREs and overlap with the proteins of differing regulatory classes. Recent studies of the interactomes of the PcG recruiters significantly expanded our understanding that they have numerous interactors besides the PcG proteins and that their functions extend beyond the regulation of the PRE repressive activity. Here, we summarize current data about the functions of the PcG recruiters.