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CHROMOSOME ORGANIZATION

Reeling it in: how DNA topology drives loop extrusion by condensin

Nature Structural & Molecular Biology volume 29, pages 623–625 (2022)Cite this article

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Structural maintenance of chromosomes (SMC) complexes such as condensin regulate chromosome organization by extruding loops. A new study uses single-molecule imaging of condensin on supercoiled DNA to understand how condensins navigate the under- and overwound DNA states common throughout the genome.

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Fig. 1: Condensin induces and coalesces positively supercoiled DNA, which acts as a binding site for additional condensins.

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Acknowledgements

We thank S. Vos and S. Nemsick for insightful comments on this piece. D.N.N. and A.S.H. are supported by the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. A.S.H. additionally acknowledges support from US National Institutes of Health grants R00GM130896, DP2GM140938, R33CA257878 and UM1HG011536, National Science Foundation grant 2036037, the Mathers Foundation and a Pew-Stewart Cancer Research Scholar grant.

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  1. Department of Biological Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Domenic N. Narducci & Anders S. Hansen

  2. The Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Domenic N. Narducci & Anders S. Hansen

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  1. Domenic N. Narducci
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  2. Anders S. Hansen
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Correspondence to Anders S. Hansen.

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Narducci, D.N., Hansen, A.S. Reeling it in: how DNA topology drives loop extrusion by condensin. Nat Struct Mol Biol 29, 623–625 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41594-022-00805-8

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