Confining euchromatin/heterochromatin territory: Jumonji crosses the line

Abstract

Heterochromatin is typically highly condensed, gene-poor, and transcriptionally silent, whereas euchromatin is less condensed, gene-rich, andmore accessible to transcription. Besides acting as a graveyard for selfish mobile DNA repeats, heterochromatin contributes to important biological functions, such as chromosome segregation during cell division. Multiple features of heterochromatin - including the presence or absence of specific histone modifications, DNAmethylation, and small RNAs - have been implicated in distinguishing heterochromatin from euchromatin in various organisms. Cells malfunction if the genome fails to restrict repressive chromatin marks within heterochromatin domains. How euchromatin and heterochromatin territories are confined remains poorly understood. Recent studies from the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe, the flowering plant Arabidopsis thaliana, and the filamentous fungusNeurospora crassa have revealed a new role for Jumonji C (JmjC) domain-containing proteins in protecting euchromatin from heterochromatin marks. © 2010 by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press.