Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • News & Views
  • Published:

Life and death rest on a bivalent chromatin state

Nature Neuroscience volume 19, pages 1271–1273 (2016)Cite this article

Subjects

Neurons require lifelong maintenance of their transcriptional program, which includes stable expression of cell-type-specific identity genes. A study now shows that PRC2-mediated chromatin repression in adulthood is critical for the maintenance of neuronal identity gene expression and neuronal survival.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Relevant articles

Open Access articles citing this article.

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: The PRC2 complex includes histone H3K27 methyltransferase Ezh1 or Ezh2, along with several other protein subunits3.

References

  1. Deneris, E.S. & Hobert, O. Nat. Neurosci. 17, 899–907 (2014).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. von Schimmelmann, M. et al. Nat. Neurosci. 19, 1321–1330 (2016).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Margueron, R. & Reinberg, D. Nature 469, 343–349 (2011).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  4. Lee, T.I. et al. Cell 125, 301–313 (2006).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Shen, X. et al. Mol. Cell 32, 491–502 (2008).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Bernstein, B.E. et al. Cell 125, 315–326 (2006).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Mikkelsen, T.S. et al. Nature 448, 553–560 (2007).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Jadhav, U. et al. Cell 165, 1389–1400 (2016).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Crook, Z.R. & Housman, D. Neuron 69, 423–435 (2011).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  10. Raymond, L.A. et al. Neuroscience 198, 252–273 (2011).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  11. Lu, X.H. et al. Sci. Transl. Med. 6, 268ra178 (2014).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Parrish, J.Z., Emoto, K., Jan, L.Y. & Jan, Y.N. Genes Dev. 21, 956–972 (2007).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  13. Baker, D.J. et al. Nature 530, 184–189 (2016).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  14. Seong, I.S. et al. Hum. Mol. Genet. 19, 573–583 (2010).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  15. Langfelder, P. et al. Nat. Neurosci. 19, 623–633 (2016).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychiatry & Biobehavioral Sciences, X. William Yang is at the Center for Neurobehavioral Genetics, Semel Institute for Human Behavior, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California at Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, USA.,

    X William Yang

Authors
  1. X William Yang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to X William Yang.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The author declares no competing financial interests.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Yang, X. Life and death rest on a bivalent chromatin state. Nat Neurosci 19, 1271–1273 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nn.4396

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nn.4396

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing