Affiliation:
1. School of Life Sciences, Chongqing University , Chongqing 401331, China
2. School of Basic Medical Sciences, Division of Life Science and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China , Hefei 230027, China
Abstract
Abstract
Stress-responsive genes are lowly transcribed under normal conditions and robustly induced in response to stress. The significant difference between basal and induced transcription indicates that the general transcriptional machinery requires a mechanism to distinguish each transcription state. However, what factors specifically function in basal transcription remains poorly understood. Using a classic model stress-responsive gene (Drosophila MtnA), we found that knockdown of the DEAD-box helicase Hlc resulted in a significant transcription attenuation of MtnA under normal, but not stressed, conditions. Mechanistically, Hlc directly binds to the MtnA locus to maintain the accessibility of chromatin near the transcriptional start site, which allows the recruitment of RNA polymerase II and subsequent MtnA transcription. Using RNA-seq, we then identified plenty of additional stress-responsive genes whose basal transcription was reduced upon knockdown of Hlc. Taken together, these data suggest that Hlc-mediated basal transcription regulation is an essential and widespread mechanism for precise control of stress-responsive genes.
Funder
National Natural Science Foundation of China
Chongqing Talents Plan for Young Talents
Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities of China
Innovation Support Program for Overseas Returned Scholars of Chongqing, China
Natural Science Foundation of Chongqing
Publisher
Oxford University Press (OUP)
Cited by
4 articles.
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