Boosting Transcription with a Little Help from Histone CrotonylationApril 24, 2015Every auto enthusiast knows that if you want to maximize the performance of your car, you’ve got to have the right parts in the right combination. While sometimes you may have to completely rebuild your engine, other times all you need is to upgrade to the latest system components. In a recent article published in […]
Pioneering Transcription Factors Wiggle Towards PluripotencyApril 24, 2015Canoes, camels, cars and catamarans have carried human pioneers far and wide; taking us to undiscovered lands to encounter unseen beauty, encouraged by the hope of fame, glory, and a lust for adventure. How pioneer transcription factors brave the inhospitable exterior of a compacted DNA-histone complex to induce transcription of tightly guarded genes is, however, […]
CRISPR Gets Creative with Histone AcetylationApril 9, 2015There’s been a lot of firsts in the world of genome editing happening lately, from its application in human embryonic stem cells, the identification of a smaller more versatile Cas9, to its upgrade to efficiently using homology-directed repair. Now CRISPR-Cas9 is getting its feet wet with epigenome editing thanks to the clever folks in the Gersbach lab […]
H3K9me3: The Genomic Pacifier That Silences SINEsMarch 30, 2015Kids can be hard to handle, between dealing with drawing on the walls and public temper tantrums; therefore all parents need a successful tactic for keeping them under control. Short INterspersed Elements (SINEs) are like the chaotic kids of the genome. These repetitive sequences make up about 11% of our genome and because of their […]
Our Favorite Findings from the Epigenomic RoadmapMarch 10, 2015For those of you with a keen eye, you’ll have already noticed the mass of Epigenomic Roadmap Studies published in Nature in February. In order to help you navigate this mountain of results we’ve highlighted some of our favorite findings from this collection of papers. Here’s our Top Five Findings: Enhancer-like Elements Take Center Stage in […]
A cHi-C Way of Capturing Chromatin ConformationMarch 9, 2015Identifying cancer risk loci is like trying to find a key you lost somewhere in your apartment. You know that it’s there and by combining experience with indistinct recollection you can even narrow it down to a few square meters. Now imagine you not only have to find the key but also map all the […]
Epigenetic Sequencing Woes Overcome by Services Know-howMarch 1, 2015Sequencing technologies have created a dizzying number of opportunities for epigenetic researchers to explore questions that couldn’t be tackled before. Despite the immense power that sequencing delivers, though, the whole process still isn’t quite as simple as pushing a big red button, and watching the groundbreaking discoveries roll in. Even as sequencing becomes faster, easier, […]
Getting started with Chromatin Conformation Capture (3C)February 15, 2015The concept of chromatin contact mapping, or determining the three-dimensional structure conformation and interactions of chromatin domains, is now a reality because of Chromatin Conformation Capture (3C) and subsequent methods born out of that approach. Several new 3C-based techniques have emerged, each with particular strengths and applications, but the sheer variety creates a challenge when […]
Expressed Long Non-coding RNAs Snitch on Tissue-specific EnhancersFebruary 11, 2015Predicting tissue-specific enhancers is a tricky business. While histone marks such as H3K4me1 and binding of p300 are good enhancer predictors, pointing out which enhancers are tissue-specific is more of a challenge. That is, of course, unless you have PreSTIGE – an algorithm developed by the Scacheri lab that identifies tissue-specific enhancers by combining H3K4me1 […]
Review: Crosslinking-Immunoprecipitation (CLIP) MethodsFebruary 8, 2015RNA-protein interactions are key to understanding human health and disease. Crosslinking-immunoprecipitation (CLIP) and related technologies are powerful tools for characterizing these interactions. Since their introduction in 2008 (Licatalosi et al., 2008), CLIP-based approaches have been applied to prominent RNA research fields such as HIV and cancer. Recently, Sebla Kutluay and colleagues used CLIP to characterize […]
