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.

  • Research Briefing
  • Published:

Quantifying how promoter-associated nucleosomes regulate transcriptional bursting

Single-molecule live-cell imaging of the transcription dynamics in budding yeast cells revealed that the remodeling of different nucleosomes in the promoter of a gene regulates various kinetic steps of transcription. The measurements also showed that the TATA-binding protein competes with promoter-associated nucleosomes around the TATA element to activate transcription.

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

Access options

Buy this article

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

Fig. 1: Remodeling of promoter-associated nucleosomes in the GAL10 promoter regulates transcriptional bursting.

References

  1. Symmons, O. & Raj, A. What’s luck got to do with it: single cells, multiple fates, and biological nondeterminism. Mol. Cell 62, 788–802 (2016). A review describing several consequences of stochastic gene expression heterogeneity.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  2. Brouwer, I. & Lenstra, T. L. Visualizing transcription: key to understanding gene expression dynamics. Curr. Opin. Chem. Biol. 51, 122–129 (2019). A review article that presents the results of imaging-based approaches to studying transcriptional bursting.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  3. Brown, C. R., Mao, C., Falkovskaia, E., Jurica, M. S. & Boeger, H. Linking stochastic fluctuations in chromatin structure and gene expression. PLoS Biol. 11, e1001621 (2013). This paper identifies a link between stochastic nucleosome positioning and gene expression.

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  4. Brouwer, I., Patel, H. P., Meeussen, J. V. W., Pomp, W. & Lenstra, T. L. Single-molecule fluorescence imaging in living Saccharomyces cerevisiae cells. STAR Protoc. 1, 100142 (2020). A protocol article that presents the method used in this study to image transcription dynamics.

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  5. Wang, H., Xiong, L. & Cramer, P. Structures and implications of TBP-nucleosome complexes. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 118, 1–7 (2021). This paper provides structural data that support our TBP–nucleosome competition model.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Additional information

Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

This is a summary of: Brouwer, I., Kerklingh, E., van Leeuwen, F. & Lenstra, T. L. Dynamic epistasis analysis reveals how chromatin remodeling regulates transcriptional bursting. Nat. Struct. Mol. Biol. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41594-023-00981-1 (2023).

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Quantifying how promoter-associated nucleosomes regulate transcriptional bursting. Nat Struct Mol Biol 30, 577–578 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41594-023-00982-0

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41594-023-00982-0

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