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Gene expression

Mutant weed breaks silence

Nature volume 405, pages 137–138 (2000)Cite this article

In many organisms, genomic DNA is decorated by the addition of methyl groups to certain cytosine residues. This phenomenon has proven hard to study in animals, in part because of the lack of genetically tractable model organisms. The models of choice — the fruitfly Drosophila melanogaster and the nematode worm Caenorhabditis elegans (to say nothing of ‘surrogate animals’ such as yeast) — lack all traces of methylated cytosine in their genomes. Fortunately this is not a problem in plants, where methylated genomes and powerful genetic methodologies coincide. The tiny weed Arabidopsis thaliana is the prime example, and researchers are making the most of this plant in their efforts to discover new facets of DNA methylation.

As in animals, DNA methylation in plants has been associated with genes that are silenced through their failure to be transcribed into RNA. Genetic analysis has already identified one gene, DDM1 (for ‘decrease in DNA methylation’), that is somehow needed to maintain both methylation and silencing of genes1,2. On page 203 of this issue3, however, Amedeo and colleagues show that silencing and methylation are not inextricably linked.

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Figure 1: Two models for the role of the MOM protein in transgene silencing in Arabidopsis, as proposed by Amedeo et al.3.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Cell and Molecular Biology, University of Edinburgh, The Kings Buildings, Edinburgh, EH9 3JR, UK

    Susan Tweedie & Adrian Bird

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  1. Susan Tweedie
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  2. Adrian Bird
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Correspondence to Susan Tweedie or Adrian Bird.

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Tweedie, S., Bird, A. Mutant weed breaks silence. Nature 405, 137–138 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1038/35012200

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