Beyond the marks: reader-effectors as drivers of epigenetics and chromatin engineering

Kierra A Franklin; Cara E Shields; Karmella A Haynes

doi:10.1016/j.tibs.2022.03.002

Beyond the marks: reader-effectors as drivers of epigenetics and chromatin engineering

Trends Biochem Sci. 2022 May;47(5):417-432. doi: 10.1016/j.tibs.2022.03.002.

Authors

Kierra A Franklin¹, Cara E Shields¹, Karmella A Haynes²

Affiliations

¹ Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering, Emory University, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA.
² Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering, Emory University, Atlanta, GA 30322, USA. Electronic address: kahayne@emory.edu.

Abstract

Chromatin is a system of proteins and DNA that regulates chromosome organization and gene expression in eukaryotes. Essential features that support these processes include biochemical marks on histones and DNA, 'writer' enzymes that generate or remove these marks and proteins that translate the marks into transcriptional regulation: reader-effectors. Here, we review recent studies that reveal how reader-effectors drive chromatin-mediated processes. Advances in proteomics and epigenomics have accelerated the discovery of chromatin marks and their correlation with gene states, outpacing our understanding of the corresponding reader-effectors. Therefore, we summarize the current state of knowledge and open questions about how reader-effectors impact cellular function and human disease and discuss how synthetic biology can deepen our knowledge of reader-effector activity.

Keywords: cell developmental disease; chromatin modifications; epigenome; protein engineering; signal integration; transcriptional regulation.

Publication types

Review
Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Chromatin* / genetics
DNA / metabolism
Epigenesis, Genetic
Epigenomics*
Histones / metabolism
Humans

Substances

Chromatin
Histones
DNA

Grants and funding

R21 CA232244/CA/NCI NIH HHS/United States