Chromatin 'programming' by sequence-is there more to the nucleosome code than %GC?

Abstract

The role of genomic sequence in directing the packaging of eukaryotic genomes into chromatin has been the subject of considerable recent debate. A new paper from Tillo and Hughes shows that the intrinsic thermodynamic preference of a given sequence in the yeast genome for the histone octamer can largely be captured with a simple model, and in fact is mostly explained by %GC. Thus, the rules for predicting nucleosome occupancy from genomic sequence are much less complicated than has been claimed. See research article http://www. biomedcentral.com/1471-2105/10/442.