1
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Chialastri A, Sarkar S, Schauer EE, Lamba S, Dey SS. Combinatorial quantification of 5mC and 5hmC at individual CpG dyads and the transcriptome in single cells reveals modulators of DNA methylation maintenance fidelity. Nat Struct Mol Biol 2024:10.1038/s41594-024-01291-w. [PMID: 38671229 DOI: 10.1038/s41594-024-01291-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/20/2022] [Accepted: 03/25/2024] [Indexed: 04/28/2024]
Abstract
Inheritance of 5-methylcytosine from one cell generation to the next by DNA methyltransferase 1 (DNMT1) plays a key role in regulating cellular identity. While recent work has shown that the activity of DNMT1 is imprecise, it remains unclear how the fidelity of DNMT1 is tuned in different genomic and cell state contexts. Here we describe Dyad-seq, a method to quantify the genome-wide methylation status of cytosines at the resolution of individual CpG dinucleotides to find that the fidelity of DNMT1-mediated maintenance methylation is related to the local density of DNA methylation and the landscape of histone modifications. To gain deeper insights into methylation/demethylation turnover dynamics, we first extended Dyad-seq to quantify all combinations of 5-methylcytosine and 5-hydroxymethylcytosine at individual CpG dyads. Next, to understand how cell state transitions impact maintenance methylation, we scaled the method down to jointly profile genome-wide methylation levels, maintenance methylation fidelity and the transcriptome from single cells (scDyad&T-seq). Using scDyad&T-seq, we demonstrate that, while distinct cell states can substantially impact the activity of the maintenance methylation machinery, locally there exists an intrinsic relationship between DNA methylation density, histone modifications and DNMT1-mediated maintenance methylation fidelity that is independent of cell state.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alex Chialastri
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA
- Department of Bioengineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA
| | - Saumya Sarkar
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA
- Department of Bioengineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA
| | - Elizabeth E Schauer
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA
- Department of Bioengineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA
| | - Shyl Lamba
- Department of Mathematics, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Siddharth S Dey
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA.
- Department of Bioengineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA.
- Neuroscience Research Institute, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA.
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2
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Espinosa-Martínez M, Alcázar-Fabra M, Landeira D. The molecular basis of cell memory in mammals: The epigenetic cycle. SCIENCE ADVANCES 2024; 10:eadl3188. [PMID: 38416817 PMCID: PMC10901381 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adl3188] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/11/2023] [Accepted: 01/26/2024] [Indexed: 03/01/2024]
Abstract
Cell memory refers to the capacity of cells to maintain their gene expression program once the initiating environmental signal has ceased. This exceptional feature is key during the formation of mammalian organisms, and it is believed to be in part mediated by epigenetic factors that can endorse cells with the landmarks required to maintain transcriptional programs upon cell duplication. Here, we review current literature analyzing the molecular basis of epigenetic memory in mammals, with a focus on the mechanisms by which transcriptionally repressive chromatin modifications such as methylation of DNA and histone H3 are propagated through mitotic cell divisions. The emerging picture suggests that cellular memory is supported by an epigenetic cycle in which reversible activities carried out by epigenetic regulators in coordination with cell cycle transition create a multiphasic system that can accommodate both maintenance of cell identity and cell differentiation in proliferating stem cell populations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mencía Espinosa-Martínez
- Centre for Genomics and Oncological Research (GENYO), Avenue de la Ilustración 114, 18016 Granada, Spain
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology II, Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Granada, Granada, Spain
- Instituto de Investigación Biosanitaria ibs.GRANADA, Granada, Spain
| | - María Alcázar-Fabra
- Centre for Genomics and Oncological Research (GENYO), Avenue de la Ilustración 114, 18016 Granada, Spain
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology II, Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Granada, Granada, Spain
- Instituto de Investigación Biosanitaria ibs.GRANADA, Granada, Spain
| | - David Landeira
- Centre for Genomics and Oncological Research (GENYO), Avenue de la Ilustración 114, 18016 Granada, Spain
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology II, Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Granada, Granada, Spain
- Instituto de Investigación Biosanitaria ibs.GRANADA, Granada, Spain
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3
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Yang J, Horton JR, Liu B, Corces VG, Blumenthal RM, Zhang X, Cheng X. Structures of CTCF-DNA complexes including all 11 zinc fingers. Nucleic Acids Res 2023; 51:8447-8462. [PMID: 37439339 PMCID: PMC10484683 DOI: 10.1093/nar/gkad594] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/25/2023] [Revised: 06/27/2023] [Accepted: 07/03/2023] [Indexed: 07/14/2023] Open
Abstract
The CCCTC-binding factor (CTCF) binds tens of thousands of enhancers and promoters on mammalian chromosomes by means of its 11 tandem zinc finger (ZF) DNA-binding domain. In addition to the 12-15-bp CORE sequence, some of the CTCF binding sites contain 5' upstream and/or 3' downstream motifs. Here, we describe two structures for overlapping portions of human CTCF, respectively, including ZF1-ZF7 and ZF3-ZF11 in complex with DNA that incorporates the CORE sequence together with either 3' downstream or 5' upstream motifs. Like conventional tandem ZF array proteins, ZF1-ZF7 follow the right-handed twist of the DNA, with each finger occupying and recognizing one triplet of three base pairs in the DNA major groove. ZF8 plays a unique role, acting as a spacer across the DNA minor groove and positioning ZF9-ZF11 to make cross-strand contacts with DNA. We ascribe the difference between the two subgroups of ZF1-ZF7 and ZF8-ZF11 to residues at the two positions -6 and -5 within each finger, with small residues for ZF1-ZF7 and bulkier and polar/charged residues for ZF8-ZF11. ZF8 is also uniquely rich in basic amino acids, which allows salt bridges to DNA phosphates in the minor groove. Highly specific arginine-guanine and glutamine-adenine interactions, used to recognize G:C or A:T base pairs at conventional base-interacting positions of ZFs, also apply to the cross-strand interactions adopted by ZF9-ZF11. The differences between ZF1-ZF7 and ZF8-ZF11 can be rationalized structurally and may contribute to recognition of high-affinity CTCF binding sites.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jie Yang
- Department of Epigenetics and Molecular Carcinogenesis, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX 77030, USA
| | - John R Horton
- Department of Epigenetics and Molecular Carcinogenesis, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX 77030, USA
| | - Bin Liu
- Department of Epigenetics and Molecular Carcinogenesis, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX 77030, USA
| | - Victor G Corces
- Department of Human Genetics, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA
| | - Robert M Blumenthal
- Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology, and Program in Bioinformatics, The University of Toledo College of Medicine and Life Sciences, Toledo, OH 43614, USA
| | - Xing Zhang
- Department of Epigenetics and Molecular Carcinogenesis, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX 77030, USA
| | - Xiaodong Cheng
- Department of Epigenetics and Molecular Carcinogenesis, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX 77030, USA
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4
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Hay AD, Kessler NJ, Gebert D, Takahashi N, Tavares H, Teixeira FK, Ferguson-Smith AC. Epigenetic inheritance is unfaithful at intermediately methylated CpG sites. Nat Commun 2023; 14:5336. [PMID: 37660134 PMCID: PMC10475082 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-40845-2] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/14/2023] [Accepted: 08/12/2023] [Indexed: 09/04/2023] Open
Abstract
DNA methylation at the CpG dinucleotide is considered a stable epigenetic mark due to its presumed long-term inheritance through clonal expansion. Here, we perform high-throughput bisulfite sequencing on clonally derived somatic cell lines to quantitatively measure methylation inheritance at the nucleotide level. We find that although DNA methylation is generally faithfully maintained at hypo- and hypermethylated sites, this is not the case at intermediately methylated CpGs. Low fidelity intermediate methylation is interspersed throughout the genome and within genes with no or low transcriptional activity, and is not coordinately maintained between neighbouring sites. We determine that the probabilistic changes that occur at intermediately methylated sites are likely due to DNMT1 rather than DNMT3A/3B activity. The observed lack of clonal inheritance at intermediately methylated sites challenges the current epigenetic inheritance model and has direct implications for both the functional relevance and general interpretability of DNA methylation as a stable epigenetic mark.
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Affiliation(s)
- Amir D Hay
- Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3EH, UK
| | - Noah J Kessler
- Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3EH, UK
| | - Daniel Gebert
- Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3EH, UK
| | - Nozomi Takahashi
- Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3EH, UK
| | - Hugo Tavares
- Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3EH, UK
| | - Felipe K Teixeira
- Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3EH, UK.
- Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3DY, UK.
| | - Anne C Ferguson-Smith
- Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3EH, UK.
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5
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Thomas S, Xu TH, Carpenter B, Pierce S, Dickson B, Liu M, Liang G, Jones P. DNA strand asymmetry generated by CpG hemimethylation has opposing effects on CTCF binding. Nucleic Acids Res 2023; 51:5997-6005. [PMID: 37094063 PMCID: PMC10325916 DOI: 10.1093/nar/gkad293] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/18/2022] [Revised: 03/23/2023] [Accepted: 04/21/2023] [Indexed: 04/26/2023] Open
Abstract
CpG methylation generally occurs on both DNA strands and is essential for mammalian development and differentiation. Until recently, hemimethylation, in which only one strand is methylated, was considered to be simply a transitory state generated during DNA synthesis. The discovery that a subset of CCCTC-binding factor (CTCF) binding sites is heritably hemimethylated suggests that hemimethylation might have an unknown biological function. Here we show that the binding of CTCF is profoundly altered by which DNA strand is methylated and by the specific CTCF binding motif. CpG methylation on the motif strand can inhibit CTCF binding by up to 7-fold, whereas methylation on the opposite strand can stimulate binding by up to 4-fold. Thus, hemimethylation can alter binding by up to 28-fold in a strand-specific manner. The mechanism for sensing methylation on the opposite strand requires two critical residues, V454 and S364, within CTCF zinc fingers 7 and 4. Similar to methylation, CpG hydroxymethylation on the motif strand can inhibit CTCF binding by up to 4-fold. However, hydroxymethylation on the opposite strand removes the stimulatory effect. Strand-specific methylation states may therefore provide a mechanism to explain the transient and dynamic nature of CTCF-mediated chromatin interactions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Stacey L Thomas
- Department of Epigenetics, Van Andel Institute, Grand Rapids, MI 49503, USA
| | - Ting-Hai Xu
- Department of Epigenetics, Van Andel Institute, Grand Rapids, MI 49503, USA
- Department of Structural Biology, Van Andel Institute, Grand Rapids, MI 49503, USA
| | | | - Steven E Pierce
- Department of Neurodegenerative Science, Van Andel Institute, Grand Rapids, MI 49503, USA
| | - Bradley M Dickson
- Department of Epigenetics, Van Andel Institute, Grand Rapids, MI 49503, USA
| | - Minmin Liu
- Department of Epigenetics, Van Andel Institute, Grand Rapids, MI 49503, USA
| | - Gangning Liang
- Department of Urology, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089, USA
| | - Peter A Jones
- Department of Epigenetics, Van Andel Institute, Grand Rapids, MI 49503, USA
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6
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Chialastri A, Sarkar S, Schauer EE, Lamba S, Dey SS. Combinatorial quantification of 5mC and 5hmC at individual CpG dyads and the transcriptome in single cells reveals modulators of DNA methylation maintenance fidelity. BIORXIV : THE PREPRINT SERVER FOR BIOLOGY 2023:2023.05.06.539708. [PMID: 37205524 PMCID: PMC10187321 DOI: 10.1101/2023.05.06.539708] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 05/21/2023]
Abstract
Transmission of 5-methylcytosine (5mC) from one cell generation to the next plays a key role in regulating cellular identity in mammalian development and diseases. While recent work has shown that the activity of DNMT1, the protein responsible for the stable inheritance of 5mC from mother to daughter cells, is imprecise; it remains unclear how the fidelity of DNMT1 is tuned in different genomic and cell state contexts. Here we describe Dyad-seq, a method that combines enzymatic detection of modified cytosines with nucleobase conversion techniques to quantify the genome-wide methylation status of cytosines at the resolution of individual CpG dinucleotides. We find that the fidelity of DNMT1-mediated maintenance methylation is directly related to the local density of DNA methylation, and for genomic regions that are lowly methylated, histone modifications can dramatically alter the maintenance methylation activity. Further, to gain deeper insights into the methylation and demethylation turnover dynamics, we extended Dyad-seq to quantify all combinations of 5mC and 5-hydroxymethylcytosine (5hmC) at individual CpG dyads to show that TET proteins preferentially hydroxymethylate only one of the two 5mC sites in a symmetrically methylated CpG dyad rather than sequentially convert both 5mC to 5hmC. To understand how cell state transitions impact DNMT1-mediated maintenance methylation, we scaled the method down and combined it with the measurement of mRNA to simultaneously quantify genome-wide methylation levels, maintenance methylation fidelity and the transcriptome from the same cell (scDyad&T-seq). Applying scDyad&T-seq to mouse embryonic stem cells transitioning from serum to 2i conditions, we observe dramatic and heterogenous demethylation and the emergence of transcriptionally distinct subpopulations that are closely linked to the cell-to-cell variability in loss of DNMT1-mediated maintenance methylation activity, with regions of the genome that escape 5mC reprogramming retaining high levels of maintenance methylation fidelity. Overall, our results demonstrate that while distinct cell states can substantially impact the genome-wide activity of the DNA methylation maintenance machinery, locally there exists an intrinsic relationship between DNA methylation density, histone modifications and DNMT1-mediated maintenance methylation fidelity that is independent of cell state.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alex Chialastri
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA
- Biological Engineering Program, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA
| | - Saumya Sarkar
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA
- Biological Engineering Program, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA
| | - Elizabeth E. Schauer
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA
- Biological Engineering Program, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA
| | - Shyl Lamba
- Department of Mathematics, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA
| | - Siddharth S. Dey
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA
- Biological Engineering Program, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA
- Neuroscience Research Institute, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA
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7
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Ayala-Guerrero L, Claudio-Galeana S, Furlan-Magaril M, Castro-Obregón S. Chromatin Structure from Development to Ageing. Subcell Biochem 2023; 102:7-51. [PMID: 36600128 DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-21410-3_2] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/06/2023]
Abstract
Nuclear structure influences genome architecture, which contributes to determine patterns of gene expression. Global changes in chromatin dynamics are essential during development and differentiation, and are one of the hallmarks of ageing. This chapter describes the molecular dynamics of chromatin structure that occur during development and ageing. In the first part, we introduce general information about the nuclear lamina, the chromatin structure, and the 3D organization of the genome. Next, we detail the molecular hallmarks found during development and ageing, including the role of DNA and histone modifications, 3D genome dynamics, and changes in the nuclear lamina. Within the chapter we discuss the implications that genome structure has on the mechanisms that drive development and ageing, and the physiological consequences when these mechanisms fail.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lorelei Ayala-Guerrero
- Departamento de Neurodesarrollo y Fisiología, Instituto de Fisiología Celular, UNAM, Mexico City, Mexico
| | - Sherlyn Claudio-Galeana
- Departamento de Genética Molecular, Instituto de Fisiología Celular, UNAM, Mexico City, Mexico
| | - Mayra Furlan-Magaril
- Departamento de Genética Molecular, Instituto de Fisiología Celular, UNAM, Mexico City, Mexico.
| | - Susana Castro-Obregón
- Departamento de Neurodesarrollo y Fisiología, Instituto de Fisiología Celular, UNAM, Mexico City, Mexico.
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8
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Mohan KN. DNMT1: catalytic and non-catalytic roles in different biological processes. Epigenomics 2022; 14:629-643. [PMID: 35410490 DOI: 10.2217/epi-2022-0035] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/24/2022] Open
Abstract
DNMT1 is the main enzyme that uses the information on DNA methylation patterns in the parent strand and methylates the daughter strand in freshly replicated hemimethylated DNA. It is widely known that DNMT1 is a component of the epigenetic machinery mediating gene repression via increased promoter methylation. However, recent data suggest that DNMT1 can also modulate gene expression independent of its catalytic activity and participates in multiple processes including the cell cycle, DNA damage repair and stem cell function. This review summarizes the noncanonical functions of DNMT1, some of which are clearly independent of maintenance methylation. Finally, phenotypic data on altered DNMT1 levels suggesting that maintenance of optimal levels of DNMT1 is vital for normal development and health is presented.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kommu Naga Mohan
- Department of Biological Sciences, Birla Institute of Technology & Science, Pilani - Hyderabad Campus, 500078, India.,Centre for Human Disease Research, Birla Institute of Technology & Science, Pilani - Hyderabad Campus, 500078, India
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9
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Stankevičius V, Gibas P, Masiulionytė B, Gasiulė L, Masevičius V, Klimašauskas S, Vilkaitis G. Selective chemical tracking of Dnmt1 catalytic activity in live cells. Mol Cell 2022; 82:1053-1065.e8. [PMID: 35245449 PMCID: PMC8901439 DOI: 10.1016/j.molcel.2022.02.008] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/13/2021] [Revised: 12/04/2021] [Accepted: 02/01/2022] [Indexed: 12/24/2022]
Abstract
Enzymatic methylation of cytosine to 5-methylcytosine in DNA is a fundamental epigenetic mechanism involved in mammalian development and disease. DNA methylation is brought about by collective action of three AdoMet-dependent DNA methyltransferases, whose catalytic interactions and temporal interplay are poorly understood. We used structure-guided engineering of the Dnmt1 methyltransferase to enable catalytic transfer of azide tags onto DNA from a synthetic cofactor analog, Ado-6-azide, in vitro. We then CRISPR-edited the Dnmt1 locus in mouse embryonic stem cells to install the engineered codon, which, following pulse internalization of the Ado-6-azide cofactor by electroporation, permitted selective azide tagging of Dnmt1-specific genomic targets in cellulo. The deposited covalent tags were exploited as “click” handles for reading adjoining sequences and precise genomic mapping of the methylation sites. The proposed approach, Dnmt-TOP-seq, enables high-resolution temporal tracking of the Dnmt1 catalysis in mammalian cells, paving the way to selective studies of other methylation pathways in eukaryotic systems. A single alanine substitution in Dnmt1 confers catalytic transfer of extended groups Electroporation permits facile delivery of AdoMet analogs into live mammalian cells Engineered Dnmt1 adds trackable azide tags at its native target sites in cellulo Dnmt-TOP-seq enables genome-wide tracking of Dnmt1 activity in live mammalian cells
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Affiliation(s)
- Vaidotas Stankevičius
- Institute of Biotechnology, Life Sciences Center, Vilnius University, Vilnius 10257, Lithuania
| | - Povilas Gibas
- Institute of Biotechnology, Life Sciences Center, Vilnius University, Vilnius 10257, Lithuania
| | - Bernadeta Masiulionytė
- Institute of Biotechnology, Life Sciences Center, Vilnius University, Vilnius 10257, Lithuania
| | - Liepa Gasiulė
- Institute of Biotechnology, Life Sciences Center, Vilnius University, Vilnius 10257, Lithuania
| | - Viktoras Masevičius
- Institute of Biotechnology, Life Sciences Center, Vilnius University, Vilnius 10257, Lithuania; Institute of Chemistry, Faculty of Chemistry and Geosciences, Vilnius University, Vilnius 03225, Lithuania
| | - Saulius Klimašauskas
- Institute of Biotechnology, Life Sciences Center, Vilnius University, Vilnius 10257, Lithuania.
| | - Giedrius Vilkaitis
- Institute of Biotechnology, Life Sciences Center, Vilnius University, Vilnius 10257, Lithuania.
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10
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Kerr L, Sproul D, Grima R. Cluster mean-field theory accurately predicts statistical properties of large-scale DNA methylation patterns. J R Soc Interface 2022; 19:20210707. [PMID: 35078341 PMCID: PMC8790364 DOI: 10.1098/rsif.2021.0707] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/08/2021] [Accepted: 12/13/2021] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
The accurate establishment and maintenance of DNA methylation patterns is vital for mammalian development and disruption to these processes causes human disease. Our understanding of DNA methylation mechanisms has been facilitated by mathematical modelling, particularly stochastic simulations. Megabase-scale variation in DNA methylation patterns is observed in development, cancer and ageing and the mechanisms generating these patterns are little understood. However, the computational cost of stochastic simulations prevents them from modelling such large genomic regions. Here, we test the utility of three different mean-field models to predict summary statistics associated with large-scale DNA methylation patterns. By comparison to stochastic simulations, we show that a cluster mean-field model accurately predicts the statistical properties of steady-state DNA methylation patterns, including the mean and variance of methylation levels calculated across a system of CpG sites, as well as the covariance and correlation of methylation levels between neighbouring sites. We also demonstrate that a cluster mean-field model can be used within an approximate Bayesian computation framework to accurately infer model parameters from data. As mean-field models can be solved numerically in a few seconds, our work demonstrates their utility for understanding the processes underpinning large-scale DNA methylation patterns.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lyndsay Kerr
- MRC Institute of Genetics and Cancer, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK
| | - Duncan Sproul
- MRC Human Genetics Unit and CRUK Edinburgh Centre, Institute of Genetics and Cancer, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK
| | - Ramon Grima
- School of Biological Sciences, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK
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11
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Huang X, Wang L, Zhao S, Liu H, Chen S, Wu L, Liu L, Ding J, Yang H, Maxwell A, Yin Z, Mor G, Liao A. Pregnancy Induces an Immunological Memory Characterized by Maternal Immune Alterations Through Specific Genes Methylation. Front Immunol 2021; 12:686676. [PMID: 34163485 PMCID: PMC8215664 DOI: 10.3389/fimmu.2021.686676] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/27/2021] [Accepted: 05/19/2021] [Indexed: 01/20/2023] Open
Abstract
During pregnancy, the maternal immune system undergoes major adaptive modifications that are necessary for the acceptance and protection of the fetus. It has been postulated that these modifications are temporary and limited to the time of pregnancy. Growing evidence suggests that pregnancy has a long-term impact on maternal health, especially among women with pregnancy complications, such as preeclampsia (PE). In addition, the presence of multiple immunological-associated changes in women that remain long after delivery has been reported. To explain these long-term modifications, we hypothesized that pregnancy induces long-term immunological memory with effects on maternal well-being. To test this hypothesis, we evaluated the immunological phenotype of circulating immune cells in women at least 1 year after a normal pregnancy and after pregnancy complicated by PE. Using multiparameter flow cytometry (FCM) and whole-genome bisulfite sequencing (WGBS), we demonstrate that pregnancy has a long-term effect on the maternal immune cell populations and that this effect differs between normal pregnancy and pregnancy complicated by PE; furthermore, these modifications are due to changes in the maternal methylation status of genes that are associated with T cell and NK cell differentiation and function. We propose the existence of an "immunological memory of pregnancy (IMOP)" as an evolutionary advantage for the success of future pregnancies and the proper adaptation to the microchimeric status established during pregnancy. Our findings demonstrate that the type of immune cell populations modified during pregnancy may have an impact on subsequent pregnancy and future maternal health.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xiaobo Huang
- Institute of Reproductive Health, Center for Reproductive Medicine, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China
| | - Liling Wang
- Institute of Reproductive Health, Center for Reproductive Medicine, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China
| | - Sijia Zhao
- Institute of Reproductive Health, Center for Reproductive Medicine, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China
| | - Hong Liu
- Institute of Reproductive Health, Center for Reproductive Medicine, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China
| | - Si Chen
- Hubei Province Engineering Research Center of Healthy Food, School of Biology and Pharmaceutical Engineering, Wuhan Polytechnic University, Wuhan, China
| | - Li Wu
- Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Center for Reproductive Medicine, Anhui Province Hospital Affiliated to Anhui Medical University, Hefei, China
| | - Liping Liu
- Wuhan Women and Children Medical Care Center, Wuhan, China
| | - Jiahui Ding
- C.S. Mott Center for Human Growth and Development, Wayne State University School of Medicine, Detroit, MI, United States
| | - Hengwen Yang
- Zhuhai Institute of Translational Medicine, Zhuhai People’s Hospital Affiliated With Jinan University, Jinan University, Zhuhai, China
- The Biomedical Translational Research Institute, Faculty of Medical Science, Jinan University, Guangzhou, China
| | - Anthony Maxwell
- C.S. Mott Center for Human Growth and Development, Wayne State University School of Medicine, Detroit, MI, United States
| | - Zhinan Yin
- Zhuhai Institute of Translational Medicine, Zhuhai People’s Hospital Affiliated With Jinan University, Jinan University, Zhuhai, China
- The Biomedical Translational Research Institute, Faculty of Medical Science, Jinan University, Guangzhou, China
| | - Gil Mor
- Institute of Reproductive Health, Center for Reproductive Medicine, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China
- C.S. Mott Center for Human Growth and Development, Wayne State University School of Medicine, Detroit, MI, United States
| | - Aihua Liao
- Institute of Reproductive Health, Center for Reproductive Medicine, Tongji Medical College, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China
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12
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Liang J, Zhang K, Yang J, Li X, Li Q, Wang Y, Cai W, Teng H, Sun Z. A new approach to decode DNA methylome and genomic variants simultaneously from double strand bisulfite sequencing. Brief Bioinform 2021; 22:6289882. [PMID: 34058751 PMCID: PMC8575003 DOI: 10.1093/bib/bbab201] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/10/2021] [Revised: 04/23/2021] [Accepted: 05/04/2021] [Indexed: 12/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Genetic and epigenetic contributions to various diseases and biological processes have been well-recognized. However, simultaneous identification of single-nucleotide variants (SNVs) and DNA methylation levels from traditional bisulfite sequencing data is still challenging. Here, we develop double strand bisulfite sequencing (DSBS) for genome-wide accurate identification of SNVs and DNA methylation simultaneously at a single-base resolution by using one dataset. Locking Watson and Crick strand together by hairpin adapter followed by bisulfite treatment and massive parallel sequencing, DSBS simultaneously sequences the bisulfite-converted Watson and Crick strand in one paired-end read, eliminating the strand bias of bisulfite sequencing data. Mutual correction of read1 and read2 can estimate the amplification and sequencing errors, and enables our developed computational pipeline, DSBS Analyzer (https://github.com/tianguolangzi/DSBS), to accurately identify SNV and DNA methylation. Additionally, using DSBS, we provide a genome-wide hemimethylation landscape in the human cells, and reveal that the density of DNA hemimethylation sites in promoter region and CpG island is lower than that in other genomic regions. The cost-effective new approach, which decodes DNA methylome and genomic variants simultaneously, will facilitate more comprehensive studies on numerous diseases and biological processes driven by both genetic and epigenetic variations.
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Affiliation(s)
| | | | - Jie Yang
- Institute of Genomic Medicine, Wenzhou Medical University, Beijing 100101, China
| | - Xianfeng Li
- Beijing Institutes of Life Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
| | - Qinglan Li
- Beijing Institutes of Life Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
| | - Yan Wang
- Beijing Institutes of Life Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
| | - Wanshi Cai
- Beijing Institutes of Life Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
| | - Huajing Teng
- Corresponding author: Zhongsheng Sun, Beijing Institutes of Life Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beichen West Road, Chao Yang District, Beijing 100101, China. Tel.: +86 10 64864959; Fax: +86 10 84504120. ; Huajing Teng, Department of Radiation Oncology, Key Laboratory of Carcinogenesis and Translational Research (Ministry of Education), Peking University Cancer Hospital and Institute, Fucheng Road, Haidian District, Beijing 100142, China. Tel.: +86 10 88196505.
| | - Zhongsheng Sun
- Corresponding author: Zhongsheng Sun, Beijing Institutes of Life Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beichen West Road, Chao Yang District, Beijing 100101, China. Tel.: +86 10 64864959; Fax: +86 10 84504120. ; Huajing Teng, Department of Radiation Oncology, Key Laboratory of Carcinogenesis and Translational Research (Ministry of Education), Peking University Cancer Hospital and Institute, Fucheng Road, Haidian District, Beijing 100142, China. Tel.: +86 10 88196505.
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13
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Liu M, Xu Y. An effective method to resolve ambiguous bisulfite-treated reads. BMC Bioinformatics 2021; 22:283. [PMID: 34044763 PMCID: PMC8161933 DOI: 10.1186/s12859-021-04204-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/27/2020] [Accepted: 05/17/2021] [Indexed: 11/10/2022] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND The combination of the bisulfite treatment and the next-generation sequencing is an important method for methylation analysis, and aligning the bisulfite-treated reads (BS-reads) is the critical step for the downstream applications. As bisulfite treatment reduces the complexity of the sequences, a large portion of BS-reads might be aligned to multiple locations of the reference genome ambiguously, called multireads. These multireads cannot be employed in the downstream applications since they are likely to introduce artifacts. To identify the best mapping location of each multiread, existing Bayesian-based methods calculate the probability of the read at each position by considering how does it overlap with unique mapped reads. However, [Formula: see text]% of multireads are not overlapped with any unique reads, which are unresolvable for existing method. RESULTS Here we propose a novel method (EM-MUL) that not only rescues multireads overlapped with unique reads, but also uses the overall coverage and accurate base-level alignment to resolve multireads that cannot be handled by current methods. We benchmark our method on both simulated datasets and real datasets. Experimental results show that it is able to align more than 80% of multireads to the best mapping position with very high accuracy. CONCLUSIONS EM-MUL is an effective method designed to accurately determine the best mapping position of multireads in BS-reads. For the downstream applications, it is useful to improve the methylation resolution on the repetitive regions of genome. EM-MUL is free available at https://github.com/lmylynn/EM-MUL.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mengya Liu
- School of Computer Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230027, Anhui, China.,Key Laboratory on High Performance Computing of Anhui Province, Hefei, China
| | - Yun Xu
- School of Computer Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230027, Anhui, China. .,Key Laboratory on High Performance Computing of Anhui Province, Hefei, China.
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14
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Hairpin-Bisulfite PCR. Methods Mol Biol 2021; 2198:287-299. [PMID: 32822039 DOI: 10.1007/978-1-0716-0876-0_22] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/23/2022]
Abstract
Ligation of a hairpin oligonucleotide to genomic DNA prior to bisulfite conversion and PCR amplification physically links the two complementary DNA strands. This additional step in the conversion procedure overcomes the limitations of conventional bisulfite sequencing where information of the cytosine methylation status is only obtained from one of the two strands of an individual DNA molecule. Sequences derived from hairpin bisulfite PCR products reveal the dynamics of this epigenetic memory system on both strands of individual DNA molecules. The chapter describes a reliable step-by-step procedure to generate hairpin-linked DNA. It also provides a guide for efficient bisulfite conversion that is suitable for both conventional and hairpin bisulfite sequencing approaches.
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15
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Simultaneously measuring the methylation of parent and daughter strands of replicated DNA at the single-molecule level by Hammer-seq. Nat Protoc 2021; 16:2131-2157. [PMID: 33686219 DOI: 10.1038/s41596-020-00488-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/22/2020] [Accepted: 12/18/2020] [Indexed: 02/07/2023]
Abstract
The stable maintenance of DNA methylation patterns during mitotic cell division is crucial for cell identity. Precisely determining the maintenance kinetics and dissecting the exact contributions of relevant regulators requires a method to accurately measure parent and daughter strand DNA methylation at the same time, ideally at the single-molecule level. Recently, we developed a method referred to as Hammer-seq (hairpin-assisted mapping of methylation of replicated DNA) that fulfils the above criteria. This method integrates 5-ethynyl-2'-deoxyuridine (EdU) labeling of replicating DNA, biotin conjugation and streptavidin-based affinity purification, and whole-genome hairpin bisulfite sequencing technologies. Hammer-seq offers the unique advantage of simultaneously measuring the methylation status of parent and daughter strands within a single DNA molecule, which makes it possible to determine maintenance kinetics across various genomic regions without averaging effects from bulk measurements and to assess de novo methylation events that accompany methylation maintenance. Importantly, when combined with mutant cell lines in which mechanisms of interest are disrupted, Hammer-seq can be applied to determine the functional contributions of potential regulators to methylation maintenance, with accurate kinetics information that cannot be acquired with other currently available methods. Hammer-seq library preparation requires ~100 ug EdU-labeled genomic DNA as input (~15 million mammalian cells). The whole protocol, from pulse labeling to library construction, can be completed within 2-3 d, depending on the chasing time.
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16
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Sen M, Mooijman D, Chialastri A, Boisset JC, Popovic M, Heindryckx B, Chuva de Sousa Lopes SM, Dey SS, van Oudenaarden A. Strand-specific single-cell methylomics reveals distinct modes of DNA demethylation dynamics during early mammalian development. Nat Commun 2021; 12:1286. [PMID: 33627650 PMCID: PMC7904860 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-21532-6] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/29/2019] [Accepted: 01/29/2021] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
DNA methylation (5mC) is central to cellular identity. The global erasure of 5mC from the parental genomes during preimplantation mammalian development is critical to reset the methylome of gametes to the cells in the blastocyst. While active and passive modes of demethylation have both been suggested to play a role in this process, the relative contribution of these two mechanisms to 5mC erasure remains unclear. Here, we report a single-cell method (scMspJI-seq) that enables strand-specific quantification of 5mC, allowing us to systematically probe the dynamics of global demethylation. When applied to mouse embryonic stem cells, we identified substantial cell-to-cell strand-specific 5mC heterogeneity, with a small group of cells displaying asymmetric levels of 5mCpG between the two DNA strands of a chromosome suggesting loss of maintenance methylation. Next, in preimplantation mouse embryos, we discovered that methylation maintenance is active till the 16-cell stage followed by passive demethylation in a fraction of cells within the early blastocyst at the 32-cell stage of development. Finally, human preimplantation embryos qualitatively show temporally delayed yet similar demethylation dynamics as mouse embryos. Collectively, these results demonstrate that scMspJI-seq is a sensitive and cost-effective method to map the strand-specific genome-wide patterns of 5mC in single cells.
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Affiliation(s)
- Maya Sen
- Oncode Institute, Hubrecht Institute-KNAW (Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences) and University Medical Center Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands
| | - Dylan Mooijman
- Oncode Institute, Hubrecht Institute-KNAW (Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences) and University Medical Center Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands
- Developmental Biology Unit, European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Heidelberg, Germany
| | - Alex Chialastri
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, 93106, USA
- Center for Bioengineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, 93106, USA
| | - Jean-Charles Boisset
- Oncode Institute, Hubrecht Institute-KNAW (Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences) and University Medical Center Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands
| | - Mina Popovic
- Ghent-Fertility and Stem cell Team (G-FaST), Department of Reproductive Medicine, Ghent University Hospital, 9000, Ghent, Belgium
| | - Björn Heindryckx
- Ghent-Fertility and Stem cell Team (G-FaST), Department of Reproductive Medicine, Ghent University Hospital, 9000, Ghent, Belgium
| | - Susana M Chuva de Sousa Lopes
- Ghent-Fertility and Stem cell Team (G-FaST), Department of Reproductive Medicine, Ghent University Hospital, 9000, Ghent, Belgium
- Department of Anatomy and Embryology, Leiden University Medical Center, 2333 ZC, Leiden, The Netherlands
| | - Siddharth S Dey
- Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, 93106, USA.
- Center for Bioengineering, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, 93106, USA.
- Neuroscience Research Institute, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, 93106, USA.
| | - Alexander van Oudenaarden
- Oncode Institute, Hubrecht Institute-KNAW (Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences) and University Medical Center Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands.
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17
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An all-to-all approach to the identification of sequence-specific readers for epigenetic DNA modifications on cytosine. Nat Commun 2021; 12:795. [PMID: 33542217 PMCID: PMC7862700 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-20950-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/15/2020] [Accepted: 12/14/2020] [Indexed: 12/31/2022] Open
Abstract
Epigenetic modifications of DNA play important roles in many biological processes. Identifying readers of these epigenetic marks is a critical step towards understanding the underlying mechanisms. Here, we present an all-to-all approach, dubbed digital affinity profiling via proximity ligation (DAPPL), to simultaneously profile human TF-DNA interactions using mixtures of random DNA libraries carrying different epigenetic modifications (i.e., 5-methylcytosine, 5-hydroxymethylcytosine, 5-formylcytosine, and 5-carboxylcytosine) on CpG dinucleotides. Many proteins that recognize consensus sequences carrying these modifications in symmetric and/or hemi-modified forms are identified. We further demonstrate that the modifications in different sequence contexts could either enhance or suppress TF binding activity. Moreover, many modifications can affect TF binding specificity. Furthermore, symmetric modifications show a stronger effect in either enhancing or suppressing TF-DNA interactions than hemi-modifications. Finally, in vivo evidence suggests that USF1 and USF2 might regulate transcription via hydroxymethylcytosine-binding activity in weak enhancers in human embryonic stem cells. Identifying readers of epigenetic marks is a critical step for understanding the role of epigenetic marks in biology. Here, the authors applied DAPPL, an all-to-all approach to profile the interactions between TFs and epigenetic modified DNA libraries.
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18
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Ming X, Zhu B, Li Y. Mitotic inheritance of DNA methylation: more than just copy and paste. J Genet Genomics 2021; 48:1-13. [PMID: 33771455 DOI: 10.1016/j.jgg.2021.01.006] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/26/2020] [Revised: 01/13/2021] [Accepted: 01/22/2021] [Indexed: 12/14/2022]
Abstract
Decades of investigation on DNA methylation have led to deeper insights into its metabolic mechanisms and biological functions. This understanding was fueled by the recent development of genome editing tools and our improved capacity for analyzing the global DNA methylome in mammalian cells. This review focuses on the maintenance of DNA methylation patterns during mitotic cell division. We discuss the latest discoveries of the mechanisms for the inheritance of DNA methylation as a stable epigenetic memory. We also highlight recent evidence showing the rapid turnover of DNA methylation as a dynamic gene regulatory mechanism. A body of work has shown that altered DNA methylomes are common features in aging and disease. We discuss the potential links between methylation maintenance mechanisms and disease-associated methylation changes.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xuan Ming
- National Laboratory of Biomacromolecules, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
| | - Bing Zhu
- National Laboratory of Biomacromolecules, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China; College of Life Sciences, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China.
| | - Yingfeng Li
- National Laboratory of Biomacromolecules, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China.
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19
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Li S, Tollefsbol TO. DNA methylation methods: Global DNA methylation and methylomic analyses. Methods 2020; 187:28-43. [PMID: 33039572 DOI: 10.1016/j.ymeth.2020.10.002] [Citation(s) in RCA: 70] [Impact Index Per Article: 17.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/13/2020] [Revised: 10/02/2020] [Accepted: 10/05/2020] [Indexed: 12/13/2022] Open
Abstract
DNA methylation provides a pivotal layer of epigenetic regulation in eukaryotes that has significant involvement for numerous biological processes in health and disease. The function of methylation of cytosine bases in DNA was originally proposed as a "silencing" epigenetic marker and focused on promoter regions of genes for decades. Improved technologies and accumulating studies have been extending our understanding of the roles of DNA methylation to various genomic contexts including gene bodies, repeat sequences and transcriptional start sites. The demand for comprehensively describing DNA methylation patterns spawns a diversity of DNA methylation profiling technologies that target its genomic distribution. These approaches have enabled the measurement of cytosine methylation from specific loci at restricted regions to single-base-pair resolution on a genome-scale level. In this review, we discuss the different DNA methylation analysis technologies primarily based on the initial treatments of DNA samples: bisulfite conversion, endonuclease digestion and affinity enrichment, involving methodology evolution, principles, applications, and their relative merits. This review may offer referable information for the selection of various platforms for genome-wide analysis of DNA methylation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shizhao Li
- Department of Biology, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, United States.
| | - Trygve O Tollefsbol
- Department of Biology, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, United States; Comprehensive Cancer Center, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, United States; Nutrition Obesity Research Center, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, United States; Comprehensive Center for Healthy Aging, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, United States; Comprehensive Diabetes Center, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, United States.
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20
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Wang Q, Yu G, Ming X, Xia W, Xu X, Zhang Y, Zhang W, Li Y, Huang C, Xie H, Zhu B, Xie W. Imprecise DNMT1 activity coupled with neighbor-guided correction enables robust yet flexible epigenetic inheritance. Nat Genet 2020; 52:828-839. [PMID: 32690947 DOI: 10.1038/s41588-020-0661-y] [Citation(s) in RCA: 54] [Impact Index Per Article: 13.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/27/2019] [Accepted: 06/08/2020] [Indexed: 12/18/2022]
Abstract
The epigenome, including DNA methylation, is stably propagated during mitotic division. However, single-cell clonal expansion produces heterogeneous methylomes, thus raising the question of how the DNA methylome remains stable despite constant epigenetic drift. Here, we report that a clonal population of DNA (cytosine-5)-methyltransferase 1 (DNMT1)-only cells produces a heterogeneous methylome, which is robustly propagated on cell expansion and differentiation. Our data show that DNMT1 has imprecise maintenance activity and possibly possesses weak de novo activity, leading to spontaneous 'epimutations'. However, these epimutations tend to be corrected through a neighbor-guided mechanism, which is likely to be enabled by the environment-sensitive de novo activity ('tuner') and maintenance activity ('stabilizer') of DNMT1. By generating base-resolution maps of de novo and maintenance activities, we find that H3K9me2/3-marked regions show enhanced de novo activity, and CpG islands have both poor maintenance and de novo activities. The imprecise epigenetic machinery coupled with neighbor-guided correction may be a fundamental mechanism underlying robust yet flexible epigenetic inheritance.
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Affiliation(s)
- Qiujun Wang
- Center for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine, MOE Key Laboratory of Bioinformatics, THU-PKU Center for Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China.,School of Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
| | - Guang Yu
- Center for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine, MOE Key Laboratory of Bioinformatics, THU-PKU Center for Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China.,School of Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
| | - Xuan Ming
- National Laboratory of Biomacromolecules, CAS Center for Excellence in Biomacromolecules, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
| | - Weikun Xia
- Center for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine, MOE Key Laboratory of Bioinformatics, THU-PKU Center for Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China.,School of Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
| | - Xiguang Xu
- Epigenomics and Computational Biology Lab, Fralin Life Sciences Institute at Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA.,Department of Biological Sciences, Department of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
| | - Yu Zhang
- School of Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
| | - Wenhao Zhang
- Center for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine, MOE Key Laboratory of Bioinformatics, THU-PKU Center for Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China.,School of Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
| | - Yuanyuan Li
- School of Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
| | - Chunyi Huang
- School of Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China
| | - Hehuang Xie
- Epigenomics and Computational Biology Lab, Fralin Life Sciences Institute at Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA.,Department of Biological Sciences, Department of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
| | - Bing Zhu
- National Laboratory of Biomacromolecules, CAS Center for Excellence in Biomacromolecules, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China. .,College of Life Sciences, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.
| | - Wei Xie
- Center for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine, MOE Key Laboratory of Bioinformatics, THU-PKU Center for Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China. .,School of Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China.
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21
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Kinetics and mechanisms of mitotic inheritance of DNA methylation and their roles in aging-associated methylome deterioration. Cell Res 2020; 30:980-996. [PMID: 32581343 DOI: 10.1038/s41422-020-0359-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 67] [Impact Index Per Article: 16.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/02/2020] [Accepted: 05/27/2020] [Indexed: 12/16/2022] Open
Abstract
Mitotic inheritance of the DNA methylome is a challenging task for the maintenance of cell identity. Whether DNA methylation pattern in different genomic contexts can all be faithfully maintained is an open question. A replication-coupled DNA methylation maintenance model was proposed decades ago, but some observations suggest that a replication-uncoupled maintenance mechanism exists. However, the capacity and the underlying molecular events of replication-uncoupled maintenance are unclear. By measuring maintenance kinetics at the single-molecule level and assessing mutant cells with perturbation of various mechanisms, we found that the kinetics of replication-coupled maintenance are governed by the UHRF1-Ligase 1 and PCNA-DNMT1 interactions, whereas nucleosome occupancy and the interaction between UHRF1 and methylated H3K9 specifically regulate replication-uncoupled maintenance. Surprisingly, replication-uncoupled maintenance is sufficiently robust to largely restore the methylome when replication-coupled maintenance is severely impaired. However, solo-WCGW sites and other CpG sites displaying aging- and cancer-associated hypomethylation exhibit low maintenance efficiency, suggesting that although quite robust, mitotic inheritance of methylation is imperfect and that this imperfection may contribute to selective hypomethylation during aging and tumorigenesis.
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22
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Charlton J, Jung EJ, Mattei AL, Bailly N, Liao J, Martin EJ, Giesselmann P, Brändl B, Stamenova EK, Müller FJ, Kiskinis E, Gnirke A, Smith ZD, Meissner A. TETs compete with DNMT3 activity in pluripotent cells at thousands of methylated somatic enhancers. Nat Genet 2020; 52:819-827. [PMID: 32514123 PMCID: PMC7415576 DOI: 10.1038/s41588-020-0639-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 67] [Impact Index Per Article: 16.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/07/2019] [Accepted: 04/30/2020] [Indexed: 12/17/2022]
Abstract
Mammalian cells stably maintain high levels of DNA methylation despite expressing both positive (DNMT3A/B) and negative (TET1-3) regulators. Here, we analyzed the independent and combined effects of these regulators on the DNA methylation landscape using a panel of knockout human embryonic stem cell (ESC) lines. The greatest impact on global methylation levels was observed in DNMT3-deficient cells, including reproducible focal demethylation at thousands of normally methylated loci. Demethylation depends on TET expression and occurs only when both DNMT3s are absent. Dynamic loci are enriched for hydroxymethylcytosine and overlap with subsets of putative somatic enhancers that are methylated in ESCs and can be activated upon differentiation. We observe similar dynamics in mouse ESCs that were less frequent in epiblast stem cells (EpiSCs) and scarce in somatic tissues, suggesting a conserved pluripotency-linked mechanism. Taken together, our data reveal tightly regulated competition between DNMT3s and TETs at thousands of somatic regulatory sequences within pluripotent cells.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jocelyn Charlton
- Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA.,Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA.,Department of Genome Regulation, Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics, Berlin, Germany
| | - Eunmi J Jung
- Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Alexandra L Mattei
- Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA.,Department of Genome Regulation, Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics, Berlin, Germany.,Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Nina Bailly
- Department of Genome Regulation, Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics, Berlin, Germany.,Institute of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany
| | - Jing Liao
- Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Eric J Martin
- The Ken & Ruth Davee Department of Neurology, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL, USA.,Department of Physiology, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL, USA
| | - Pay Giesselmann
- Department of Genome Regulation, Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics, Berlin, Germany
| | - Björn Brändl
- Department of Genome Regulation, Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics, Berlin, Germany
| | | | - Franz-Josef Müller
- Department of Genome Regulation, Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics, Berlin, Germany.,Zentrum für Integrative Psychiatrie gGmbH, Universitätsklinikum Schleswig-Holstein, Kiel, Germany
| | - Evangelos Kiskinis
- The Ken & Ruth Davee Department of Neurology, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL, USA.,Department of Physiology, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL, USA
| | | | - Zachary D Smith
- Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA.,Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Alexander Meissner
- Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA. .,Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA. .,Department of Genome Regulation, Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics, Berlin, Germany. .,Institute of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany.
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23
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Liu Y, Weyrich LS, Llamas B. More Arrows in the Ancient DNA Quiver: Use of Paleoepigenomes and Paleomicrobiomes to Investigate Animal Adaptation to Environment. Mol Biol Evol 2020; 37:307-319. [PMID: 31638147 DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msz231] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Whether and how epigenetic mechanisms and the microbiome play a role in mammalian adaptation raised considerable attention and controversy, mainly because they have the potential to add new insights into the Modern Synthesis. Recent attempts to reconcile neo-Darwinism and neo-Lamarckism in a unified theory of molecular evolution give epigenetic mechanisms and microbiome a prominent role. However, supporting empirical data are still largely missing. Because experimental studies using extant animals can hardly be done over evolutionary timescales, we propose that advances in ancient DNA techniques provide a valid alternative. In this piece, we evaluate 1) the possible roles of epigenomes and microbiomes in animal adaptation, 2) advances in the retrieval of paleoepigenome and paleomicrobiome data using ancient DNA techniques, and 3) the plasticity of either and interactions between the epigenome and the microbiome, while emphasizing that it is essential to take both into account, as well as the underlying genetic factors that may confound the findings. We propose that advanced ancient DNA techniques should be applied to a wide range of past animals, so novel dynamics in animal evolution and adaption can be revealed.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yichen Liu
- Australian Centre for Ancient DNA, School of Biological Sciences, Environment Institute, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
| | - Laura S Weyrich
- Australian Centre for Ancient DNA, School of Biological Sciences, Environment Institute, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
| | - Bastien Llamas
- Australian Centre for Ancient DNA, School of Biological Sciences, Environment Institute, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
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24
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Yin L, Luo Y, Xu X, Wen S, Wu X, Lu X, Xie H. Virtual methylome dissection facilitated by single-cell analyses. Epigenetics Chromatin 2019; 12:66. [PMID: 31711526 PMCID: PMC6844058 DOI: 10.1186/s13072-019-0310-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/02/2019] [Accepted: 10/21/2019] [Indexed: 12/31/2022] Open
Abstract
Background Numerous cell types can be identified within plant tissues and animal organs, and the epigenetic modifications underlying such enormous cellular heterogeneity are just beginning to be understood. It remains a challenge to infer cellular composition using DNA methylomes generated for mixed cell populations. Here, we propose a semi-reference-free procedure to perform virtual methylome dissection using the nonnegative matrix factorization (NMF) algorithm. Results In the pipeline that we implemented to predict cell-subtype percentages, putative cell-type-specific methylated (pCSM) loci were first determined according to their DNA methylation patterns in bulk methylomes and clustered into groups based on their correlations in methylation profiles. A representative set of pCSM loci was then chosen to decompose target methylomes into multiple latent DNA methylation components (LMCs). To test the performance of this pipeline, we made use of single-cell brain methylomes to create synthetic methylomes of known cell composition. Compared with highly variable CpG sites, pCSM loci achieved a higher prediction accuracy in the virtual methylome dissection of synthetic methylomes. In addition, pCSM loci were shown to be good predictors of the cell type of the sorted brain cells. The software package developed in this study is available in the GitHub repository (https://github.com/Gavin-Yinld). Conclusions We anticipate that the pipeline implemented in this study will be an innovative and valuable tool for the decoding of cellular heterogeneity.
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Affiliation(s)
- Liduo Yin
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, 650223, China.,Kunming College of Life Science, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100101, China.,Center for Excellence in Animal Evolution and Genetics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, 650223, China
| | - Yanting Luo
- Key Laboratory of Genomic and Precision Medicine, Beijing Institute of Genomics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100101, China
| | - Xiguang Xu
- Epigenomics and Computational Biology Lab, Fralin Life Sciences Institute at Virginia Tech, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, 24061, USA.,Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, 24061, USA
| | - Shiyu Wen
- Key Laboratory of Genomic and Precision Medicine, Beijing Institute of Genomics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100101, China
| | - Xiaowei Wu
- Department of Statistics, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, 24061, USA
| | - Xuemei Lu
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, 650223, China. .,Center for Excellence in Animal Evolution and Genetics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, 650223, China. .,School of Future Technology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100101, China.
| | - Hehuang Xie
- Epigenomics and Computational Biology Lab, Fralin Life Sciences Institute at Virginia Tech, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, 24061, USA. .,Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, 24061, USA. .,Department of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, 24061, USA.
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25
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Dou X, Boyd-Kirkup JD, McDermott J, Zhang X, Li F, Rong B, Zhang R, Miao B, Chen P, Cheng H, Xue J, Bennett D, Wong J, Lan F, Han JDJ. The strand-biased mitochondrial DNA methylome and its regulation by DNMT3A. Genome Res 2019; 29:1622-1634. [PMID: 31537639 PMCID: PMC6771398 DOI: 10.1101/gr.234021.117] [Citation(s) in RCA: 52] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/18/2019] [Accepted: 08/23/2019] [Indexed: 01/19/2023]
Abstract
How individual genes are regulated from a mitochondrial polycistronic transcript to have variable expression remains an enigma. Here, through bisulfite sequencing and strand-specific mapping, we show mitochondrial genomes in humans and other animals are strongly biased to light (L)-strand non-CpG methylation with conserved peak loci preferentially located at gene-gene boundaries, which was also independently validated by MeDIP and FspEI digestion. Such mtDNA methylation patterns are conserved across different species and developmental stages but display dynamic local or global changes during development and aging. Knockout of DNMT3A alone perturbed mtDNA regional methylation patterns, but not global levels, and altered mitochondrial gene expression, copy number, and oxygen respiration. Overexpression of DNMT3A strongly increased mtDNA methylation and strand bias. Overall, methylation at gene bodies and boundaries was negatively associated with mitochondrial transcript abundance and also polycistronic transcript processing. Furthermore, HPLC-MS confirmed the methylation signals on mitochondria DNA. Together, these data provide high-resolution mtDNA methylation maps that revealed a strand-specific non-CpG methylation, its dynamic regulation, and its impact on the polycistronic mitochondrial transcript processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xiaoyang Dou
- Key Laboratory of Computational Biology, CAS Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Collaborative Innovation Center for Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences-Max Planck Partner Institute for Computational Biology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, China.,University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China
| | - Jerome D Boyd-Kirkup
- Key Laboratory of Computational Biology, CAS Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Collaborative Innovation Center for Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences-Max Planck Partner Institute for Computational Biology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, China
| | - Joseph McDermott
- Key Laboratory of Computational Biology, CAS Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Collaborative Innovation Center for Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences-Max Planck Partner Institute for Computational Biology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, China
| | - Xiaoli Zhang
- Key Laboratory of Computational Biology, CAS Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Collaborative Innovation Center for Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences-Max Planck Partner Institute for Computational Biology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, China.,Peking-Tsinghua Center for Life Sciences, Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Center for Quantitative Biology (CQB), Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
| | - Fang Li
- Key Laboratory of Computational Biology, CAS Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Collaborative Innovation Center for Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences-Max Planck Partner Institute for Computational Biology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, China
| | - Bowen Rong
- Liver Cancer Institute, Zhongshan Hospital, Fudan University, Key Laboratory of Carcinogenesis and Cancer Invasion, Ministry of Education, Key Laboratory of Epigenetics, Shanghai Ministry of Education, and Institutes of Biomedical Sciences, Fudan University, Shanghai 200032, China
| | - Rui Zhang
- Key Laboratory of Computational Biology, CAS Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Collaborative Innovation Center for Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences-Max Planck Partner Institute for Computational Biology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, China
| | - Bisi Miao
- Liver Cancer Institute, Zhongshan Hospital, Fudan University, Key Laboratory of Carcinogenesis and Cancer Invasion, Ministry of Education, Key Laboratory of Epigenetics, Shanghai Ministry of Education, and Institutes of Biomedical Sciences, Fudan University, Shanghai 200032, China
| | - Peilin Chen
- Shanghai Key Laboratory of Regulatory Biology, Institute of Biomedical Sciences and School of Life Sciences, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200241, China
| | - Hao Cheng
- Key Laboratory of Computational Biology, CAS Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Collaborative Innovation Center for Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences-Max Planck Partner Institute for Computational Biology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, China
| | - Jianhuang Xue
- The State Key Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, China
| | - David Bennett
- Rush Alzheimer's Disease Center, Rush University Medical Center, Chicago, Illinois 60612, USA
| | - Jiemin Wong
- Shanghai Key Laboratory of Regulatory Biology, Institute of Biomedical Sciences and School of Life Sciences, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200241, China
| | - Fei Lan
- Liver Cancer Institute, Zhongshan Hospital, Fudan University, Key Laboratory of Carcinogenesis and Cancer Invasion, Ministry of Education, Key Laboratory of Epigenetics, Shanghai Ministry of Education, and Institutes of Biomedical Sciences, Fudan University, Shanghai 200032, China
| | - Jing-Dong J Han
- Key Laboratory of Computational Biology, CAS Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Collaborative Innovation Center for Genetics and Developmental Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences-Max Planck Partner Institute for Computational Biology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, China.,Peking-Tsinghua Center for Life Sciences, Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Center for Quantitative Biology (CQB), Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
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26
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Xu C, Corces VG. Resolution of the DNA methylation state of single CpG dyads using in silico strand annealing and WGBS data. Nat Protoc 2019; 14:202-216. [PMID: 30542058 DOI: 10.1038/s41596-018-0090-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/14/2023]
Abstract
Whole-genome bisulfite sequencing (WGBS) has been widely used to quantify cytosine DNA methylation frequency in an expanding array of cell and tissue types. Because of the denaturing conditions used, this method ultimately leads to the measurement of methylation frequencies at single cytosines. Hence, the methylation frequency of CpG dyads (two complementary CG dinucleotides) can be only indirectly inferred by overlaying the methylation frequency of two cytosines measured independently. Furthermore, hemi-methylated CpGs (hemiCpGs) have not been previously analyzed in WGBS studies. We recently developed in silico strand annealing (iSA), a bioinformatics method applicable to WGBS data, to resolve the methylation status of CpG dyads into unmethylated, hemi-methylated, and methylated. HemiCpGs account for 4-20% of the DNA methylome in different cell types, and some can be inherited across cell divisions, suggesting a role as a stable epigenetic mark. Therefore, it is important to resolve hemiCpGs from fully methylated CpGs in WGBS studies. This protocol describes step-by-step commands to accomplish this task, including dividing alignments by strand, pairing alignments between strands, and extracting single-fragment methylation calls. The versatility of iSA enables its application downstream of other WGBS-related methods such as nasBS-seq (nascent DNA bisulfite sequencing), ChIP-BS-seq (ChIP followed by bisulfite sequencing), TAB-seq, oxBS-seq, and fCAB-seq. iSA is also tunable for analyzing the methylation status of cytosines in any sequence context. We exemplify this flexibility by uncovering the single-fragment non-CpG methylome. This protocol provides enough details for users with little experience in bioinformatic analysis and takes 2-7 h.
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Affiliation(s)
- Chenhuan Xu
- Department of Biology, Emory University, Atlanta, GA, USA
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27
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Banerjee S, Wei X, Xie H. Recursive Motif Analyses Identify Brain Epigenetic Transcription Regulatory Modules. Comput Struct Biotechnol J 2019; 17:507-515. [PMID: 31011409 PMCID: PMC6462766 DOI: 10.1016/j.csbj.2019.04.003] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/10/2019] [Revised: 03/12/2019] [Accepted: 04/03/2019] [Indexed: 01/26/2023] Open
Abstract
DNA methylation is an epigenetic modification modulating the structure of DNA molecule and the interactions with its binding proteins. Accumulating large-scale methylation data motivates the development of analytic tools to facilitate methylome data mining. One critical phenomenon associated with dynamic DNA methylation is the altered DNA binding affinity of transcription factors, which plays key roles in gene expression regulation. In this study, we conceived an algorithm to predict epigenetic regulatory modules through recursive motif analyses on differentially methylated loci. A two-step procedure was implemented to first group differentially methylated loci into clusters according to their correlations in methylation profiles and then to repeatedly identify the transcription factor binding motifs significantly enriched in each cluster. We applied this tool on methylome datasets generated for mouse brains which have a lack of DNA demethylation enzymes TET1 or TET2. Compared with wild type control, the differentially methylated CpG sites identified in TET1 knockout mouse brains differed significantly from those determined for TET2 knockout. Transcription factors with zinc finger DNA binding domains including Egr1, Zic3, and Zeb1 were predicted to be associated with TET1 mediated brain methylome programming, while Lhx family members with Homeobox domains were predicted to be associated with TET2 function. Interestingly, genomic loci from a co-methylated cluster often host motifs for transcription factors sharing the same DNA binding domains. Altogether, our study provided a systematic approach for epigenetic regulatory module identification and will help throw light on the interplay of DNA methylation and transcription factors.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sharmi Banerjee
- Bradley Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA.,Biocomplexity Institute of Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA
| | - Xiaoran Wei
- Biocomplexity Institute of Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA.,Department of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA
| | - Hehuang Xie
- Biocomplexity Institute of Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA.,Department of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA.,School of Neuroscience, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA
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28
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Taka N, Karube I, Yoshida W. Direct Detection of Hemi-methylated DNA by SRA-fused Luciferase Based on Bioluminescence Resonance Energy Transfer. ANAL LETT 2018. [DOI: 10.1080/00032719.2018.1533022] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/27/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Natsumi Taka
- School of Bioscience and Biotechnology, Graduate School of Bionics, Tokyo University of Technology, Hachioji, Tokyo, Japan
| | - Isao Karube
- School of Bioscience and Biotechnology, Graduate School of Bionics, Tokyo University of Technology, Hachioji, Tokyo, Japan
| | - Wataru Yoshida
- School of Bioscience and Biotechnology, Graduate School of Bionics, Tokyo University of Technology, Hachioji, Tokyo, Japan
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29
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Zhu Q, Stöger R, Alberio R. A Lexicon of DNA Modifications: Their Roles in Embryo Development and the Germline. Front Cell Dev Biol 2018; 6:24. [PMID: 29637072 PMCID: PMC5880922 DOI: 10.3389/fcell.2018.00024] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/20/2017] [Accepted: 02/27/2018] [Indexed: 12/12/2022] Open
Abstract
5-methylcytosine (5mC) on CpG dinucleotides has been viewed as the major epigenetic modification in eukaryotes for a long time. Apart from 5mC, additional DNA modifications have been discovered in eukaryotic genomes. Many of these modifications are thought to be solely associated with DNA damage. However, growing evidence indicates that some base modifications, namely 5-hydroxymethylcytosine (5hmC), 5-formylcytosine (5fC), 5-carboxylcytosine (5caC), and N6-methadenine (6mA), may be of biological relevance, particularly during early stages of embryo development. Although abundance of these DNA modifications in eukaryotic genomes can be low, there are suggestions that they cooperate with other epigenetic markers to affect DNA-protein interactions, gene expression, defense of genome stability and epigenetic inheritance. Little is still known about their distribution in different tissues and their functions during key stages of the animal lifecycle. This review discusses current knowledge and future perspectives of these novel DNA modifications in the mammalian genome with a focus on their dynamic distribution during early embryonic development and their potential function in epigenetic inheritance through the germ line.
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Affiliation(s)
- Qifan Zhu
- School of Biosciences, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, United Kingdom
| | - Reinhard Stöger
- School of Biosciences, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, United Kingdom
| | - Ramiro Alberio
- School of Biosciences, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, United Kingdom
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30
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Luo Y, He J, Xu X, Sun MA, Wu X, Lu X, Xie H. Integrative single-cell omics analyses reveal epigenetic heterogeneity in mouse embryonic stem cells. PLoS Comput Biol 2018; 14:e1006034. [PMID: 29561833 PMCID: PMC5862410 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1006034] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/25/2017] [Accepted: 02/09/2018] [Indexed: 12/29/2022] Open
Abstract
Embryonic stem cells (ESCs) consist of a population of self-renewing cells displaying extensive phenotypic and functional heterogeneity. Research towards the understanding of the epigenetic mechanisms underlying the heterogeneity among ESCs is still in its initial stage. Key issues, such as how to identify cell-subset specifically methylated loci and how to interpret the biological meanings of methylation variations remain largely unexplored. To fill in the research gap, we implemented a computational pipeline to analyze single-cell methylome and to perform an integrative analysis with single-cell transcriptome data. According to the origins of variation in DNA methylation, we determined the genomic loci associated with allelic-specific methylation or asymmetric DNA methylation, and explored a beta mixture model to infer the genomic loci exhibiting cell-subset specific methylation (CSM). We observed that the putative CSM loci in ESCs are significantly enriched in CpG island (CGI) shelves and regions with histone marks for promoter and enhancer, and the genes hosting putative CSM loci show wide-ranging expression among ESCs. More interestingly, the putative CSM loci may be clustered into co-methylated modules enriching the binding motifs of distinct sets of transcription factors. Taken together, our study provided a novel tool to explore single-cell methylome and transcriptome to reveal the underlying transcriptional regulatory networks associated with epigenetic heterogeneity of ESCs. DNA methylation is an epigenetic mark with covalent modification that occurs directly on genetic material. In vertebrates, the most common form of DNA methylation is 5-methylcytosine (5-mC) at which a methyl group (CH3) is attached to the cytosine nucleotide, especially in the context of CpG dinucleotide. DNA methylation has important regulatory roles in a broad range of biological processes and diseases, such as embryonic stem cells (ESCs) differentiation and development. ESC populations can be strikingly heterogeneous in DNA methylation. Emerging single-cell methods for capturing DNA methylation are being developed with the exciting potential to investigate the DNA methylation feature within complex and heterogeneous tissues. In this study, we implemented a computational pipeline to infer cell-subset specific methylation of ESCs from single-cell methylome. Through integrative analyses with transcription factor binding and single-cell transcriptome, we explored the underlying regulatory mechanisms associated with methylation heterogeneity in ESCs to interpret the biological functional relevance of methylation variations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yanting Luo
- Key Laboratory of Genomic and Precision Medicine, Beijing Institute of Genomics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
- CAS Center for Excellence in Animal Evolution and Genetics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
- University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
| | - Jianlin He
- Key Laboratory of Genomic and Precision Medicine, Beijing Institute of Genomics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
- University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
- Epigenomics and Computational Biology Lab, Biocomplexity Institute of Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, United States of America
| | - Xiguang Xu
- Epigenomics and Computational Biology Lab, Biocomplexity Institute of Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, United States of America
- Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, United States of America
| | - Ming-an Sun
- University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
| | - Xiaowei Wu
- Department of Statistics, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, United States of America
| | - Xuemei Lu
- Key Laboratory of Genomic and Precision Medicine, Beijing Institute of Genomics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
- CAS Center for Excellence in Animal Evolution and Genetics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
- University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
- * E-mail: (XL); (HX)
| | - Hehuang Xie
- Epigenomics and Computational Biology Lab, Biocomplexity Institute of Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, United States of America
- Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, United States of America
- Department of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, United States of America
- * E-mail: (XL); (HX)
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31
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Affiliation(s)
- Jafar Sharif
- Developmental Genetics Group, Center for Integrative Medical Sciences (IMS), RIKEN, 1-7-22 Suehiro, Tsurumi, Yokohama, Kanagawa 230-0045, Japan
| | - Haruhiko Koseki
- Developmental Genetics Group, Center for Integrative Medical Sciences (IMS), RIKEN, 1-7-22 Suehiro, Tsurumi, Yokohama, Kanagawa 230-0045, Japan
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32
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Xu C, Corces VG. Nascent DNA methylome mapping reveals inheritance of hemimethylation at CTCF/cohesin sites. Science 2018; 359:1166-1170. [PMID: 29590048 PMCID: PMC6359960 DOI: 10.1126/science.aan5480] [Citation(s) in RCA: 61] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/28/2017] [Revised: 12/15/2017] [Accepted: 01/16/2018] [Indexed: 12/29/2022]
Abstract
The faithful inheritance of the epigenome is critical for cells to maintain gene expression programs and cellular identity across cell divisions. We mapped strand-specific DNA methylation after replication forks and show maintenance of the vast majority of the DNA methylome within 20 minutes of replication and inheritance of some hemimethylated CpG dinucleotides (hemiCpGs). Mapping the nascent DNA methylome targeted by each of the three DNA methyltransferases (DNMTs) reveals interactions between DNMTs and substrate daughter cytosines en route to maintenance methylation or hemimethylation. Finally, we show the inheritance of hemiCpGs at short regions flanking CCCTC-binding factor (CTCF)/cohesin binding sites in pluripotent cells. Elimination of hemimethylation causes reduced frequency of chromatin interactions emanating from these sites, suggesting a role for hemimethylation as a stable epigenetic mark regulating CTCF-mediated chromatin interactions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Chenhuan Xu
- Department of Biology, Emory University, 1510 Clifton Road NE, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA
| | - Victor G Corces
- Department of Biology, Emory University, 1510 Clifton Road NE, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA.
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33
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Masser DR, Hadad N, Porter H, Stout MB, Unnikrishnan A, Stanford DR, Freeman WM. Analysis of DNA modifications in aging research. GeroScience 2018; 40:11-29. [PMID: 29327208 PMCID: PMC5832665 DOI: 10.1007/s11357-018-0005-3] [Citation(s) in RCA: 32] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/27/2017] [Accepted: 01/05/2018] [Indexed: 12/22/2022] Open
Abstract
As geroscience research extends into the role of epigenetics in aging and age-related disease, researchers are being confronted with unfamiliar molecular techniques and data analysis methods that can be difficult to integrate into their work. In this review, we focus on the analysis of DNA modifications, namely cytosine methylation and hydroxymethylation, through next-generation sequencing methods. While older techniques for modification analysis performed relative quantitation across regions of the genome or examined average genome levels, these analyses lack the desired specificity, rigor, and genomic coverage to firmly establish the nature of genomic methylation patterns and their response to aging. With recent methodological advances, such as whole genome bisulfite sequencing (WGBS), bisulfite oligonucleotide capture sequencing (BOCS), and bisulfite amplicon sequencing (BSAS), cytosine modifications can now be readily analyzed with base-specific, absolute quantitation at both cytosine-guanine dinucleotide (CG) and non-CG sites throughout the genome or within specific regions of interest by next-generation sequencing. Additional advances, such as oxidative bisulfite conversion to differentiate methylation from hydroxymethylation and analysis of limited input/single-cells, have great promise for continuing to expand epigenomic capabilities. This review provides a background on DNA modifications, the current state-of-the-art for sequencing methods, bioinformatics tools for converting these large data sets into biological insights, and perspectives on future directions for the field.
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Affiliation(s)
- Dustin R Masser
- Reynolds Oklahoma Center on Aging, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
- Department of Physiology, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
- Oklahoma Nathan Shock Center for Aging, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
| | - Niran Hadad
- Reynolds Oklahoma Center on Aging, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
- Oklahoma Nathan Shock Center for Aging, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
- Oklahoma Center for Neuroscience, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
| | - Hunter Porter
- Reynolds Oklahoma Center on Aging, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
- Oklahoma Nathan Shock Center for Aging, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
- Oklahoma Center for Neuroscience, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
| | - Michael B Stout
- Reynolds Oklahoma Center on Aging, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
- Department of Nutritional Sciences, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
| | - Archana Unnikrishnan
- Reynolds Oklahoma Center on Aging, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
- Department of Geriatric Medicine, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
| | - David R Stanford
- Reynolds Oklahoma Center on Aging, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
- Department of Physiology, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
- Oklahoma Center for Neuroscience, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA
| | - Willard M Freeman
- Reynolds Oklahoma Center on Aging, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA.
- Department of Physiology, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA.
- Oklahoma Nathan Shock Center for Aging, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA.
- Oklahoma Center for Neuroscience, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA.
- Department of Nutritional Sciences, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK, USA.
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34
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Kelsey G, Stegle O, Reik W. Single-cell epigenomics: Recording the past and predicting the future. Science 2018; 358:69-75. [PMID: 28983045 DOI: 10.1126/science.aan6826] [Citation(s) in RCA: 250] [Impact Index Per Article: 41.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/12/2022]
Abstract
Single-cell multi-omics has recently emerged as a powerful technology by which different layers of genomic output-and hence cell identity and function-can be recorded simultaneously. Integrating various components of the epigenome into multi-omics measurements allows for studying cellular heterogeneity at different time scales and for discovering new layers of molecular connectivity between the genome and its functional output. Measurements that are increasingly available range from those that identify transcription factor occupancy and initiation of transcription to long-lasting and heritable epigenetic marks such as DNA methylation. Together with techniques in which cell lineage is recorded, this multilayered information will provide insights into a cell's past history and its future potential. This will allow new levels of understanding of cell fate decisions, identity, and function in normal development, physiology, and disease.
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Affiliation(s)
- Gavin Kelsey
- Epigenetics Programme, Babraham Institute, Cambridge CB22 3AT, UK. .,Centre for Trophoblast Research, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EG, UK
| | - Oliver Stegle
- European Molecular Biology Laboratory, European Bioinformatics Institute, Wellcome Genome Campus, CB10 1SD Hinxton, Cambridge, UK. .,European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Genome Biology Unit, Heidelberg 69117, Germany
| | - Wolf Reik
- Epigenetics Programme, Babraham Institute, Cambridge CB22 3AT, UK. .,Centre for Trophoblast Research, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EG, UK.,Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Cambridge CB10 1SA, UK
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35
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Patkin E, Grudinina N, Sasina L, Noniashvili E, Pavlinova L, Suchkova I, Kustova M, Kolmakov N, Van Truong T, Sofronov G. Asymmetric DNA methylation between sister chromatids of metaphase chromosomes in mouse embryos upon bisphenol A action. Reprod Toxicol 2017; 74:1-9. [DOI: 10.1016/j.reprotox.2017.08.017] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/24/2017] [Revised: 07/24/2017] [Accepted: 08/18/2017] [Indexed: 12/17/2022]
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36
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Huang X, Li S, Ni P, Gao Y, Jiang B, Zhou Z, Zhan A. Rapid response to changing environments during biological invasions: DNA methylation perspectives. Mol Ecol 2017; 26:6621-6633. [PMID: 29057612 DOI: 10.1111/mec.14382] [Citation(s) in RCA: 54] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/28/2017] [Revised: 10/01/2017] [Accepted: 10/07/2017] [Indexed: 12/14/2022]
Abstract
Dissecting complex interactions between species and their environments has long been a research hot spot in the fields of ecology and evolutionary biology. The well-recognized Darwinian evolution has well-explained long-term adaptation scenarios; however, "rapid" processes of biological responses to environmental changes remain largely unexplored, particularly molecular mechanisms such as DNA methylation that have recently been proposed to play crucial roles in rapid environmental adaptation. Invasive species, which have capacities to successfully survive rapidly changing environments during biological invasions, provide great opportunities to study molecular mechanisms of rapid environmental adaptation. Here, we used the methylation-sensitive amplified polymorphism (MSAP) technique in an invasive model ascidian, Ciona savignyi, to investigate how species interact with rapidly changing environments at the whole-genome level. We detected quite rapid DNA methylation response: significant changes of DNA methylation frequency and epigenetic differentiation between treatment and control groups occurred only after 1 hr of high-temperature exposure or after 3 hr of low-salinity challenge. In addition, we detected time-dependent hemimethylation changes and increased intragroup epigenetic divergence induced by environmental stresses. Interestingly, we found evidence of DNA methylation resilience, as most stress-induced DNA methylation variation maintained shortly (~48 hr) and quickly returned back to the control levels. Our findings clearly showed that invasive species could rapidly respond to acute environmental changes through DNA methylation modifications, and rapid environmental changes left significant epigenetic signatures at the whole-genome level. All these results provide fundamental background to deeply investigate the contribution of DNA methylation mechanisms to rapid contemporary environmental adaptation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xuena Huang
- Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.,University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
| | - Shiguo Li
- Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
| | - Ping Ni
- Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.,University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
| | - Yangchun Gao
- Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.,University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
| | - Bei Jiang
- Liaoning Key Lab of Marine Fishery Molecular Biology, Liaoning Ocean and Fishery Science Research Institute, Dalian, Liaoning, China
| | - Zunchun Zhou
- Liaoning Key Lab of Marine Fishery Molecular Biology, Liaoning Ocean and Fishery Science Research Institute, Dalian, Liaoning, China
| | - Aibin Zhan
- Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.,University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
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37
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Choi M, Genereux DP, Goodson J, Al-Azzawi H, Allain SQ, Simon N, Palasek S, Ware CB, Cavanaugh C, Miller DG, Johnson WC, Sinclair KD, Stöger R, Laird CD. Epigenetic memory via concordant DNA methylation is inversely correlated to developmental potential of mammalian cells. PLoS Genet 2017; 13:e1007060. [PMID: 29107996 PMCID: PMC5690686 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1007060] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/29/2017] [Revised: 11/16/2017] [Accepted: 10/08/2017] [Indexed: 11/25/2022] Open
Abstract
In storing and transmitting epigenetic information, organisms must balance the need to maintain information about past conditions with the capacity to respond to information in their current and future environments. Some of this information is encoded by DNA methylation, which can be transmitted with variable fidelity from parent to daughter strand. High fidelity confers strong pattern matching between the strands of individual DNA molecules and thus pattern stability over rounds of DNA replication; lower fidelity confers reduced pattern matching, and thus greater flexibility. Here, we present a new conceptual framework, Ratio of Concordance Preference (RCP), that uses double-stranded methylation data to quantify the flexibility and stability of the system that gave rise to a given set of patterns. We find that differentiated mammalian cells operate with high DNA methylation stability, consistent with earlier reports. Stem cells in culture and in embryos, in contrast, operate with reduced, albeit significant, methylation stability. We conclude that preference for concordant DNA methylation is a consistent mode of information transfer, and thus provides epigenetic stability across cell divisions, even in stem cells and those undergoing developmental transitions. Broader application of our RCP framework will permit comparison of epigenetic-information systems across cells, developmental stages, and organisms whose methylation machineries differ substantially or are not yet well understood.
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Affiliation(s)
- Minseung Choi
- Department of Biology, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
- Department of Computer Science, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey, United States of America
| | - Diane P. Genereux
- Broad Institute of Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States of America
| | - Jamie Goodson
- Department of Pathology, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
| | - Haneen Al-Azzawi
- School of Biosciences, University of Nottingham, Sutton Bonington Campus, Loughborough, Leicestershire, United Kingdom
| | - Shannon Q. Allain
- Department of Biology, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
| | - Noah Simon
- Department of Biostatistics, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
| | - Stan Palasek
- Department of Mathematics, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey, United States of America
| | - Carol B. Ware
- Department of Comparative Medicine, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
- Institute for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
| | - Chris Cavanaugh
- Department of Comparative Medicine, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
- Institute for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
| | - Daniel G. Miller
- Institute for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
- Department of Pediatrics, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
| | - Winslow C. Johnson
- Department of Biology, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States of America
| | - Kevin D. Sinclair
- School of Biosciences, University of Nottingham, Sutton Bonington Campus, Loughborough, Leicestershire, United Kingdom
| | - Reinhard Stöger
- School of Biosciences, University of Nottingham, Sutton Bonington Campus, Loughborough, Leicestershire, United Kingdom
| | - Charles D. Laird
- Department of Biology, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
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38
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Agba OB, Lausser L, Huse K, Bergmeier C, Jahn N, Groth M, Bens M, Sahm A, Gall M, Witte OW, Kestler HA, Schwab M, Platzer M. Tissue-, sex-, and age-specific DNA methylation of rat glucocorticoid receptor gene promoter and insulin-like growth factor 2 imprinting control region. Physiol Genomics 2017; 49:690-702. [PMID: 28916632 DOI: 10.1152/physiolgenomics.00009.2017] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/01/2017] [Revised: 08/28/2017] [Accepted: 09/12/2017] [Indexed: 12/21/2022] Open
Abstract
Tissue-, sex-, and age-specific epigenetic modifications such as DNA methylation are largely unknown. Changes in DNA methylation of the glucocorticoid receptor gene (NR3C1) and imprinting control region (ICR) of IGF2 and H19 genes during the lifespan are particularly interesting since these genes are susceptible to epigenetic modifications by prenatal stress or malnutrition. They are important regulators of development and aging. Methylation changes of NR3C1 affect glucocorticoid receptor expression, which is associated with stress sensitivity and stress-related diseases predominantly occurring during aging. Methylation changes of IGF2/H19 affect growth trajectory and nutrient use with risk of metabolic syndrome. Using a locus-specific approach, we characterized DNA methylation patterns of different Nr3c1 promoters and Igf2/H19 ICR in seven tissues of rats at 3, 9, and 24 mo of age. We found a complex pattern of locus-, tissue-, sex-, and age-specific DNA methylation. Tissue-specific methylation was most prominent at the shores of the Nr3c1 CpG island (CGI). Sex-specific differences in methylation peaked at 9 mo. During aging, Nr3c1 predominantly displayed hypomethylation mainly in females and at shores, whereas hypermethylation occurred within the CGI. Igf2/H19 ICR exhibited age-related hypomethylation occurring mainly in males. Methylation patterns of Nr3c1 in the skin correlated with those in the cortex, hippocampus, and hypothalamus. Skin may serve as proxy for methylation changes in central parts of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis and hence for vulnerability to stress- and age-associated diseases. Thus, we provide in-depth insight into the complex DNA methylation changes of rat Nr3c1 and Igf2/H19 during aging that are tissue and sex specific.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ogechukwu Brenda Agba
- Genome Analysis, Leibniz Institute on Aging - Fritz Lipmann Institute, Jena, Germany
| | - Ludwig Lausser
- Systems Biology of Aging, Leibniz Institute on Aging - Fritz Lipmann Institute, Jena, Germany.,Institute of Medical Systems Biology, Ulm University, Ulm, Germany; and
| | - Klaus Huse
- Genome Analysis, Leibniz Institute on Aging - Fritz Lipmann Institute, Jena, Germany
| | - Christoph Bergmeier
- Hans Berger Department of Neurology, Jena University Hospital, Jena, Germany
| | - Niels Jahn
- Genome Analysis, Leibniz Institute on Aging - Fritz Lipmann Institute, Jena, Germany.,Institute of Medical Systems Biology, Ulm University, Ulm, Germany; and.,Hans Berger Department of Neurology, Jena University Hospital, Jena, Germany
| | - Marco Groth
- Genome Analysis, Leibniz Institute on Aging - Fritz Lipmann Institute, Jena, Germany
| | - Martin Bens
- Genome Analysis, Leibniz Institute on Aging - Fritz Lipmann Institute, Jena, Germany
| | - Arne Sahm
- Genome Analysis, Leibniz Institute on Aging - Fritz Lipmann Institute, Jena, Germany
| | - Maria Gall
- Hans Berger Department of Neurology, Jena University Hospital, Jena, Germany
| | - Otto W Witte
- Hans Berger Department of Neurology, Jena University Hospital, Jena, Germany
| | - Hans A Kestler
- Systems Biology of Aging, Leibniz Institute on Aging - Fritz Lipmann Institute, Jena, Germany.,Institute of Medical Systems Biology, Ulm University, Ulm, Germany; and
| | - Matthias Schwab
- Hans Berger Department of Neurology, Jena University Hospital, Jena, Germany
| | - Matthias Platzer
- Genome Analysis, Leibniz Institute on Aging - Fritz Lipmann Institute, Jena, Germany;
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39
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Boyle M, Mann J. WITHDRAWN: Epigenetics in Chronic Liver Disease. J Hepatol 2017:S0168-8278(17)32255-9. [PMID: 28855099 DOI: 10.1016/j.jhep.2017.08.016] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/01/2017] [Revised: 08/17/2017] [Accepted: 08/18/2017] [Indexed: 12/04/2022]
Abstract
This article has been withdrawn at the request of the editors. The Publisher apologizes for any inconvenience this may cause. The full Elsevier Policy on Article Withdrawal can be found at https://www.elsevier.com/about/our-business/policies/article-withdrawal.
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Affiliation(s)
- Marie Boyle
- Institute of Cellular Medicine, Faculty of Medical Sciences, 4(th) Floor, William Leech Building, Newcastle University, Framlington Place, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE2 4HH, UK
| | - Jelena Mann
- Institute of Cellular Medicine, Faculty of Medical Sciences, 4(th) Floor, William Leech Building, Newcastle University, Framlington Place, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE2 4HH, UK.
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40
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Yuan XL, Zhang Z, Li B, Gao N, Zhang H, Sangild PT, Li JQ. Genome-wide DNA methylation analysis of the porcine hypothalamus-pituitary-ovary axis. Sci Rep 2017; 7:4277. [PMID: 28655931 PMCID: PMC5487323 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-04603-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/03/2016] [Accepted: 04/03/2017] [Indexed: 12/21/2022] Open
Abstract
Previous studies have suggested that DNA methylation in both CpG and CpH (where H = C, T or A) contexts plays a critical role in biological functions of different tissues. However, the genome-wide DNA methylation patterns of porcine hypothalamus-pituitary-ovary (HPO) tissues remain virtually unexplored. In this study, methylomes of HPO tissues were profiled to investigate their differences and similarities. We found that HPO methylomes displayed tissue-specific methylation patterns in both CpG and CpH contexts. At gene locations, the methylation and density of CpGs was negatively linked at transcription start sites but positively linked at transcription end sites. The densities of CpGs and CpHs at CpG island (CGI) locations were negatively correlated with their methylation. Moreover, the methylation interactions between CGIs and genes showed similar pattern in the CpG context but tissue-specific pattern in the CpH context. CpGs located in CGIs, upstream regions and exons were protected from methylation dynamics, whereas CGI shores, CGI shelves and intergenic regions were more likely to be targets of methylation changes. The methylation dynamics enriching in a tissue-specific manner appeared to maintain and establish the biological functions of HPO tissues. Our analyses provided valuable insights into the tissue-specific methylomes of porcine HPO tissues.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xiao-Long Yuan
- Guangdong Provincial Key Lab of Agro-Animal Genomics and Molecular Breeding, National Engineering Research Centre for Breeding Swine Industry, College of Animal Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China
- Section of Comparative Pediatrics and Nutrition, Department of Veterinary Clinical and Animal Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Frederiksberg, Denmark
| | - Zhe Zhang
- Guangdong Provincial Key Lab of Agro-Animal Genomics and Molecular Breeding, National Engineering Research Centre for Breeding Swine Industry, College of Animal Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China
| | - Bin Li
- Guangdong Provincial Key Lab of Agro-Animal Genomics and Molecular Breeding, National Engineering Research Centre for Breeding Swine Industry, College of Animal Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China
| | - Ning Gao
- Guangdong Provincial Key Lab of Agro-Animal Genomics and Molecular Breeding, National Engineering Research Centre for Breeding Swine Industry, College of Animal Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China
- Department of Animal Sciences, Georg-August University, Albrecht Thaer-Weg 3, Göttingen, Germany
| | - Hao Zhang
- Guangdong Provincial Key Lab of Agro-Animal Genomics and Molecular Breeding, National Engineering Research Centre for Breeding Swine Industry, College of Animal Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China
| | - Per Torp Sangild
- Section of Comparative Pediatrics and Nutrition, Department of Veterinary Clinical and Animal Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Frederiksberg, Denmark
| | - Jia-Qi Li
- Guangdong Provincial Key Lab of Agro-Animal Genomics and Molecular Breeding, National Engineering Research Centre for Breeding Swine Industry, College of Animal Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China.
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41
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Genome-wide identification of inter-individually variable DNA methylation sites improves the efficacy of epigenetic association studies. NPJ Genom Med 2017; 2:11. [PMID: 29263827 PMCID: PMC5677974 DOI: 10.1038/s41525-017-0016-5] [Citation(s) in RCA: 42] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/17/2016] [Revised: 03/07/2017] [Accepted: 03/17/2017] [Indexed: 12/19/2022] Open
Abstract
Epigenome-wide association studies, which searches for blood-based DNA methylation signatures associated with environmental exposures and/or disease susceptibilities, is a promising approach to a better understanding of the molecular aetiology of common diseases. To carry out large-scale epigenome-wide association studies while avoiding false negative detection, an efficient strategy to determine target CpG sites for microarray-based or sequencing-based DNA methylation profiling is essentially needed. Here, we propose and validate a hypothesis that a strategy focusing on CpG sites with high DNA methylation level variability may attain an improved efficacy. Through whole-genome bisulfite sequencing of purified blood cells collected from > 100 apparently healthy subjects, we identified ~2.0 million inter-individually variable CpG sites as potential targets. The efficacy of our strategy was estimated to be 3.7-fold higher than that of the most frequently used strategy. Our catalogue of inter-individually variable CpG sites will accelerate the discovery of clinically relevant DNA methylation biomarkers in future epigenome-wide association studies.
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42
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Hardy T, Mann DA. Epigenetics in liver disease: from biology to therapeutics. Gut 2016; 65:1895-1905. [PMID: 27624887 PMCID: PMC5099193 DOI: 10.1136/gutjnl-2015-311292] [Citation(s) in RCA: 111] [Impact Index Per Article: 13.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/28/2016] [Revised: 07/29/2016] [Accepted: 08/01/2016] [Indexed: 02/06/2023]
Abstract
Knowledge of the fundamental epigenetic mechanisms governing gene expression and cellular phenotype are sufficiently advanced that novel insights into the epigenetic control of chronic liver disease are now emerging. Hepatologists are in the process of shedding light on the roles played by DNA methylation, histone/chromatin modifications and non-coding RNAs in specific liver pathologies. Alongside these discoveries are advances in the technologies for the detection and quantification of epigenetic biomarkers, either directly from patient tissue or from body fluids. The premise for this review is to survey the recent advances in the field of liver epigenetics and to explore their potential for translation by industry and clinical hepatologists for the design of novel therapeutics and diagnostic/prognostic biomarkers. In particular, we present findings in the context of hepatocellular carcinoma, fibrosis and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, where there is urgent unmet need for new clinical interventions and biomarkers.
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Affiliation(s)
- Timothy Hardy
- Fibrosis Laboratories, Institute of Cellular Medicine, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK,Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, The Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK
| | - Derek A Mann
- Fibrosis Laboratories, Institute of Cellular Medicine, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK
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43
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44
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Sun MA, Sun Z, Wu X, Rajaram V, Keimig D, Lim J, Zhu H, Xie H. Mammalian Brain Development is Accompanied by a Dramatic Increase in Bipolar DNA Methylation. Sci Rep 2016; 6:32298. [PMID: 27585862 PMCID: PMC5010034 DOI: 10.1038/srep32298] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/20/2015] [Accepted: 08/02/2016] [Indexed: 12/14/2022] Open
Abstract
DNA methylation is an epigenetic mechanism critical for tissue development and cell specification. Mammalian brains consist of many different types of cells with assumedly distinct DNA methylation profiles, and thus some genomic loci may demonstrate bipolar DNA methylation pattern, i.e. hypermethylated in one cell subset but hypomethylated in others. Currently, how extensive methylation patterns vary among brain cells is unknown and bipolar methylated genomic loci remain largely unexplored. In this study, we implemented a procedure to infer cell-subset specific methylated (CSM) loci from the methylomes of human and mouse frontal cortices at different developmental stages. With the genome-scale hairpin bisulfite sequencing approach, we demonstrated that the majority of CSM loci predicted likely resulted from the methylation differences among brain cells rather than from asymmetric DNA methylation between DNA double strands. Correlated with enhancer-associated histone modifications, putative CSM loci increased dramatically during early stages of brain development and were enriched for GWAS variants associated with neurological disorder-related diseases/traits. Altogether, this study provides a procedure to identify genomic regions showing methylation differences in a mixed cell population and our results suggest that a set of cis-regulatory elements are primed in early postnatal life whose functions may be compromised in human neurological disorders.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ming-An Sun
- Epigenomics and Computational Biology Lab, Biocomplexity Institute of Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
| | - Zhixiong Sun
- Epigenomics and Computational Biology Lab, Biocomplexity Institute of Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA.,Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
| | - Xiaowei Wu
- Department of Statistics, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
| | - Veena Rajaram
- Department of Pathology, Children's Medical center, Dallas 75235 , USA.,Department of Pathology, UT Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX 75235, USA
| | - David Keimig
- Epigenomics and Computational Biology Lab, Biocomplexity Institute of Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
| | - Jessica Lim
- Epigenomics and Computational Biology Lab, Biocomplexity Institute of Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA.,Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
| | - Hongxiao Zhu
- Department of Statistics, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
| | - Hehuang Xie
- Epigenomics and Computational Biology Lab, Biocomplexity Institute of Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA.,Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA.,School of Neuroscience, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA.,Interdisciplinary Ph.D. Program in Genomics, Bioinformatics, and Computational Biology, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA.,Ph.D. Program in Translational Biology, Medicine, and Health, Virginia Tech, Blacksbury, VA 24061, USA
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45
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Consuegra S, Rodríguez López CM. Epigenetic-induced alterations in sex-ratios in response to climate change: An epigenetic trap? Bioessays 2016; 38:950-8. [PMID: 27548838 DOI: 10.1002/bies.201600058] [Citation(s) in RCA: 25] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/27/2022]
Abstract
We hypothesize that under the predicted scenario of climate change epigenetically mediated environmental sex determination could become an epigenetic trap. Epigenetically regulated environmental sex determination is a mechanism by which species can modulate their breeding strategies to accommodate environmental change. Growing evidence suggests that epigenetic mechanisms may play a key role in phenotypic plasticity and in the rapid adaptation of species to environmental change, through the capacity of organisms to maintain a non-genetic plastic memory of the environmental and ecological conditions experienced by their parents. However, inherited epigenetic variation could also be maladaptive, becoming an epigenetic trap. This is because environmental sex determination can alter sex ratios by increasing the survival of one of the sexes at the expense of negative fitness consequences for the other, which could lead not only to the collapse of natural populations, but also have an impact in farmed animal and plant species.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sofia Consuegra
- Department of Biosciences, College of Science, Swansea University, Swansea, UK.
| | - Carlos M Rodríguez López
- Environmental Epigenetics and Genetics Group, School of Agriculture, University of Adelaide, Glen Osmond, South Australia, Australia.
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46
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Sharif J, Endo T, Nakayama M, Karimi M, Shimada M, Katsuyama K, Goyal P, Brind’Amour J, Sun MA, Sun Z, Ishikura T, Mizutani-Koseki Y, Ohara O, Shinkai Y, Nakanishi M, Xie H, Lorincz M, Koseki H. Activation of Endogenous Retroviruses in Dnmt1 −/− ESCs Involves Disruption of SETDB1-Mediated Repression by NP95 Binding to Hemimethylated DNA. Cell Stem Cell 2016; 19:81-94. [DOI: 10.1016/j.stem.2016.03.013] [Citation(s) in RCA: 66] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/06/2015] [Revised: 02/07/2016] [Accepted: 03/22/2016] [Indexed: 12/21/2022]
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47
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Single-cell 5hmC sequencing reveals chromosome-wide cell-to-cell variability and enables lineage reconstruction. Nat Biotechnol 2016; 34:852-6. [PMID: 27347753 DOI: 10.1038/nbt.3598] [Citation(s) in RCA: 117] [Impact Index Per Article: 14.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/23/2015] [Accepted: 05/11/2016] [Indexed: 12/17/2022]
Abstract
The epigenetic DNA modification 5-hydroxymethylcytosine (5hmC) has crucial roles in development and gene regulation. Quantifying the abundance of this epigenetic mark at the single-cell level could enable us to understand its roles. We present a single-cell, genome-wide and strand-specific 5hmC sequencing technology, based on 5hmC glucosylation and glucosylation-dependent digestion of DNA, that reveals pronounced cell-to-cell variability in the abundance of 5hmC on the two DNA strands of a given chromosome. We develop a mathematical model that reproduces the strand bias and use this model to make two predictions. First, the variation in strand bias should decrease when 5hmC turnover increases. Second, the strand bias of two sister cells should be strongly anti-correlated. We validate these predictions experimentally, and use our model to reconstruct lineages of two- and four-cell mouse embryos, showing that single-cell 5hmC sequencing can be used as a lineage reconstruction tool.
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48
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Zhang C, Hoshida Y, Sadler KC. Comparative Epigenomic Profiling of the DNA Methylome in Mouse and Zebrafish Uncovers High Interspecies Divergence. Front Genet 2016; 7:110. [PMID: 27379160 PMCID: PMC4911366 DOI: 10.3389/fgene.2016.00110] [Citation(s) in RCA: 24] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/24/2015] [Accepted: 05/31/2016] [Indexed: 12/12/2022] Open
Abstract
The DNA methylation landscape is dynamically patterned during development and distinct methylation patterns distinguish healthy from diseased cells. However, whether tissue-specific methylation patterns are conserved across species is not known. We used comparative methylome analysis of base-resolution DNA methylation profiles from the liver and brain of mouse and zebrafish generated by reduced representation bisulfite sequencing to identify the conserved and divergent aspects of the methylome in these commonly used vertebrate model organisms. On average, 24% of CpGs are methylated in mouse livers and the pattern of methylation was highly concordant among four male mice from two different strains. The same level of methylation (24.2%) was identified in mouse brain. In striking contrast, zebrafish had 63 and 70% of CpG methylation in the liver and brain, respectively. This is attributed, in part, to the higher percentage of the zebrafish genome occupied by transposable elements (52% vs. 45% in mice). Thus, the species identity was more significant in determining methylome patterning than was the similarity in organ function. Conserved features of the methylome across tissues and species was the exclusion of methylation from promoters and from CpG islands near transcription start sites, and the clustering of methylated CpGs in gene bodies and intragenic regions. These data suggest that DNA methylation reflects species-specific genome structure, and supports the notion that DNA methylation in non-promoter regions may contribute to genome evolution.
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Affiliation(s)
- Chi Zhang
- Department of Medicine/Division of Liver Diseases, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New YorkNY, USA
- Department of Developmental and Regenerative Biology, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New YorkNY, USA
- Liver Cancer Program/Tisch Cancer Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New YorkNY, USA
| | - Yujin Hoshida
- Department of Medicine/Division of Liver Diseases, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New YorkNY, USA
- Liver Cancer Program/Tisch Cancer Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New YorkNY, USA
| | - Kirsten C. Sadler
- Department of Medicine/Division of Liver Diseases, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New YorkNY, USA
- Department of Developmental and Regenerative Biology, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New YorkNY, USA
- Liver Cancer Program/Tisch Cancer Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New YorkNY, USA
- Program in Biology, New York University Abu DhabiAbu Dhabi, UAE
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49
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Campos-Sánchez R, Cremona MA, Pini A, Chiaromonte F, Makova KD. Integration and Fixation Preferences of Human and Mouse Endogenous Retroviruses Uncovered with Functional Data Analysis. PLoS Comput Biol 2016; 12:e1004956. [PMID: 27309962 PMCID: PMC4911145 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1004956] [Citation(s) in RCA: 32] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/15/2016] [Accepted: 04/29/2016] [Indexed: 01/24/2023] Open
Abstract
Endogenous retroviruses (ERVs), the remnants of retroviral infections in the germ line, occupy ~8% and ~10% of the human and mouse genomes, respectively, and affect their structure, evolution, and function. Yet we still have a limited understanding of how the genomic landscape influences integration and fixation of ERVs. Here we conducted a genome-wide study of the most recently active ERVs in the human and mouse genome. We investigated 826 fixed and 1,065 in vitro HERV-Ks in human, and 1,624 fixed and 242 polymorphic ETns, as well as 3,964 fixed and 1,986 polymorphic IAPs, in mouse. We quantitated >40 human and mouse genomic features (e.g., non-B DNA structure, recombination rates, and histone modifications) in ±32 kb of these ERVs' integration sites and in control regions, and analyzed them using Functional Data Analysis (FDA) methodology. In one of the first applications of FDA in genomics, we identified genomic scales and locations at which these features display their influence, and how they work in concert, to provide signals essential for integration and fixation of ERVs. The investigation of ERVs of different evolutionary ages (young in vitro and polymorphic ERVs, older fixed ERVs) allowed us to disentangle integration vs. fixation preferences. As a result of these analyses, we built a comprehensive model explaining the uneven distribution of ERVs along the genome. We found that ERVs integrate in late-replicating AT-rich regions with abundant microsatellites, mirror repeats, and repressive histone marks. Regions favoring fixation are depleted of genes and evolutionarily conserved elements, and have low recombination rates, reflecting the effects of purifying selection and ectopic recombination removing ERVs from the genome. In addition to providing these biological insights, our study demonstrates the power of exploiting multiple scales and localization with FDA. These powerful techniques are expected to be applicable to many other genomic investigations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Rebeca Campos-Sánchez
- Genetics Graduate Program, The Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, Penn State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, United States of America
| | - Marzia A. Cremona
- MOX—Modeling and Scientific Computing, Department of Mathematics, Politecnico di Milano, Milano, Italy
- Department of Statistics, Penn State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, United States of America
| | - Alessia Pini
- MOX—Modeling and Scientific Computing, Department of Mathematics, Politecnico di Milano, Milano, Italy
| | - Francesca Chiaromonte
- Department of Statistics, Penn State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, United States of America
- Center for Medical Genomics, The Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, Penn State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, United States of America
| | - Kateryna D. Makova
- Center for Medical Genomics, The Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, Penn State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, United States of America
- Department of Biology, Penn State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, United States of America
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von Meyenn F, Iurlaro M, Habibi E, Liu NQ, Salehzadeh-Yazdi A, Santos F, Petrini E, Milagre I, Yu M, Xie Z, Kroeze LI, Nesterova TB, Jansen JH, Xie H, He C, Reik W, Stunnenberg HG. Impairment of DNA Methylation Maintenance Is the Main Cause of Global Demethylation in Naive Embryonic Stem Cells. Mol Cell 2016; 62:848-861. [PMID: 27237052 PMCID: PMC4914828 DOI: 10.1016/j.molcel.2016.04.025] [Citation(s) in RCA: 146] [Impact Index Per Article: 18.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/05/2016] [Revised: 04/04/2016] [Accepted: 04/21/2016] [Indexed: 12/20/2022]
Abstract
Global demethylation is part of a conserved program of epigenetic reprogramming to naive pluripotency. The transition from primed hypermethylated embryonic stem cells (ESCs) to naive hypomethylated ones (serum-to-2i) is a valuable model system for epigenetic reprogramming. We present a mathematical model, which accurately predicts global DNA demethylation kinetics. Experimentally, we show that the main drivers of global demethylation are neither active mechanisms (Aicda, Tdg, and Tet1-3) nor the reduction of de novo methylation. UHRF1 protein, the essential targeting factor for DNMT1, is reduced upon transition to 2i, and so is recruitment of the maintenance methylation machinery to replication foci. Concurrently, there is global loss of H3K9me2, which is needed for chromatin binding of UHRF1. These mechanisms synergistically enforce global DNA hypomethylation in a replication-coupled fashion. Our observations establish the molecular mechanism for global demethylation in naive ESCs, which has key parallels with those operating in primordial germ cells and early embryos. Impaired DNA methylation maintenance is the cause of global demethylation in naive ESCs Loss of H3K9me2 and UHRF1 lead to impaired maintenance targeting to replication foci TET enzymes are not required for global demethylation Mathematical model accurately predicts global 5mC and 5hmC during epigenetic resetting
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Mario Iurlaro
- Epigenetics Programme, Babraham Institute, Cambridge CB22 3AT, UK
| | - Ehsan Habibi
- Department of Molecular Biology, Faculty of Science, Radboud University, 6525GA Nijmegen, the Netherlands
| | - Ning Qing Liu
- Department of Molecular Biology, Faculty of Science, Radboud University, 6525GA Nijmegen, the Netherlands
| | - Ali Salehzadeh-Yazdi
- Hematology-Oncology and Stem Cell Transplantation Research Center, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran
| | - Fátima Santos
- Epigenetics Programme, Babraham Institute, Cambridge CB22 3AT, UK
| | - Edoardo Petrini
- Epigenetics Programme, Babraham Institute, Cambridge CB22 3AT, UK
| | - Inês Milagre
- Epigenetics Programme, Babraham Institute, Cambridge CB22 3AT, UK
| | - Miao Yu
- Department of Chemistry, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, and Institute for Biophysical Dynamics, The University of Chicago, 929 East 57th Street, Chicago, IL 60637, USA; Howard Hughes Medical Institute, The University of Chicago, 929 East 57th Street, Chicago, IL 60637, USA
| | - Zhenqing Xie
- Virginia Bioinformatics Institute and Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA 24060, USA
| | - Leonie I Kroeze
- Department of Laboratory Medicine, Laboratory of Hematology, Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Centre and Radboudumc Institute for Molecular Life Sciences (RIMLS), 6525GA Nijmegen, the Netherlands
| | - Tatyana B Nesterova
- Developmental Epigenetics Group, Department of Biochemistry, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3QU, UK
| | - Joop H Jansen
- Department of Laboratory Medicine, Laboratory of Hematology, Radboud University Nijmegen Medical Centre and Radboudumc Institute for Molecular Life Sciences (RIMLS), 6525GA Nijmegen, the Netherlands
| | - Hehuang Xie
- Virginia Bioinformatics Institute and Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA 24060, USA
| | - Chuan He
- Department of Chemistry, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, and Institute for Biophysical Dynamics, The University of Chicago, 929 East 57th Street, Chicago, IL 60637, USA; Howard Hughes Medical Institute, The University of Chicago, 929 East 57th Street, Chicago, IL 60637, USA
| | - Wolf Reik
- Epigenetics Programme, Babraham Institute, Cambridge CB22 3AT, UK; Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Hinxton, Cambridge CB10 1SA, UK.
| | - Hendrik G Stunnenberg
- Department of Molecular Biology, Faculty of Science, Radboud University, 6525GA Nijmegen, the Netherlands.
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