2The transcription elongation factor Spt6 and the H3K36 methyltransferase Set2 are both required for H3K36 methylation and transcriptional fidelity in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. By selecting for suppressors of a transcriptional defect in an spt6 mutant, we have isolated dominant SET2 mutations (SET2 sup mutations) in a region encoding a proposed autoinhibitory domain. The SET2 sup mutations suppress the H3K36 methylation defect in the spt6 mutant, as well as in other mutants that impair H3K36 methylation. ChIP-seq studies demonstrate that the H3K36 methylation defect in the spt6 mutant, as well as its suppression by a SET2 sup mutation, occur at a step following the recruitment of Set2 to chromatin. Other experiments show that a similar genetic relationship between Spt6 and Set2 exists in Schizosaccharomyces pombe.Taken together, our results suggest a conserved mechanism by which the Set2 autoinhibitory domain requires multiple interactions to ensure that H3K36 methylation occurs specifically on actively transcribed chromatin.. CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license It is made available under a was not peer-reviewed) is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity.The copyright holder for this preprint (which . http://dx.doi.org/10.1101/364521 doi: bioRxiv preprint first posted online Jul. 8, 2018; 3
IntroductionThe histone chaperone Spt6 is a highly conserved transcription elongation factor required for many aspects of transcription and chromatin structure. Spt6 binds directly to Rpb1, the largest subunit of RNA polymerase II (RNAPII) [1][2][3][4][5][6] , to histones and nucleosomes [7][8][9] , and to the essential transcription factor Spn1/Iws1 9-12 . Mutations in S. cerevisiae SPT6 cause genome-wide changes in histone occupancy [13][14][15][16] and impair several histone modifications, including H3K36 di-and trimethylation (H3K36me2/me3) catalyzed by the H3K36 methyltransferase Set2 [17][18][19][20] . Mutations in SPT6 also cause greatly elevated levels of transcripts that arise from within coding regions on both sense and antisense strands, known as intragenic transcription 15,[21][22][23][24] . Intragenic transcription has recently emerged as a mechanism to express alternative genetic information within a coding region (for example, [25][26][27][28][29] ).Regulation of intragenic transcription by Spt6 occurs, at least in part, by its regulation of H3K36 methylation, as a deletion of SET2 also causes genome-wide expression of intragenic transcripts 17,30,31 . Set2 normally represses intragenic transcription via its association with RNAPII during transcription elongation, resulting in H3K36me2/me3 over gene bodies [32][33][34] . This histone modification is required for the co-transcriptional function of the Rpd3S histone deacetylase complex 17,[35][36][37][38] . Deacetylation by Rpd3S over transcribed regions is believed to maintain a repressive environment that prevents intragenic transcription. Regulation of intragenic transcription by H3K36 methylation is co...