Osmotic Stress-dependent Repression Is Mediated by Histone H3 Phosphorylation and Chromatin Structure

Abstract

Histone H3 phosphorylation has been linked to various environmental stress responses and specific chromatin structure. The role of H3 phosphorylation in the osmotic stress response was investigated on the mouse mammary tumor virus (MMTV) promoter in different chromatin configurations. Hormone-dependent transcription from the MMTV promoter is repressed by osmotic stress when the promoter is integrated and has a normal chromatin structure. However, when the MMTV promoter is transiently transfected, the chromatin structure is less organized, and hormone induction is not affected by osmotic stress. On the integrated MMTV promoter, phosphorylation of histone H3 serine 10 and 28 increases in response to osmotic stress, but the transient promoter shows no change. Hormonedependent glucocorticoid receptor binding is reduced on the repressed promoter, and elevated H3 phosphorylation is temporally correlated with maximal MMTV repression Additionally, the protein kinase C inhibitor rottlerin, but not other kinase inhibitors, blocks both histone H3 phosphorylation and osmotic repression of MMTV transcription. Glucocorticoid receptor binding is inversely correlated with H3 phosphorylation, suggesting that displacement of the glucocorticoid receptor from the promoter is due to H3 phosphorylation and is the mechanism for the osmotic repression of hormone-dependent transcription.

Tousled-like Kinases Modulate Reactivation of Gammaherpesviruses from Latency

“…It has been shown that TLKs can phosphorylate histone H3 at the serine 10 position (Li Y, 2001). This histone modification has been shown to modulate transcription (Burkhart et al, 2007, Goto et al, 1999, Van Hooser et al, 1998, Lefebvre, 2002, Mahadevan et al, 1991). In latently infected cells, the KSHV ORF50 promoter is associated with repressive histone, which is released upon reactivation (Gunther and Grundhoff, 2010, Toth et al, 2010).…”

Osmotic stress induces phosphorylation of histone H3 at threonine 3 in pericentromeric regions of Arabidopsis thaliana

“…Interestingly, in both metazoans and plants, histone phosphorylation appears to be involved in responses to osmotic/salt stress (3,17,(19)(20)(21). In Arabidopsis the expression of most histone genes is down-regulated by dehydration conditions (43) and exposure of tobacco BY-2 cells to sucrose or NaCl resulted in induction of H3T3 phosphorylation (21).…”

“…Phosphorylation of histone H3 is evolutionarily conserved at several sites including Ser 10 and 28 (H3S10ph and H3S28ph) and Thr 3 and 11 (H3T3ph and H3T11ph) (11)(12)(13)15). In metazoans, a variety of environmental stimuli can trigger histone H3 phosphorylation, both globally and at specific genes in interphase cells (11,14,(17)(18)(19). In plants, dynamic changes in histone H3 phosphorylation were also observed in cultured cells exposed to abiotic stress, such as high salt or low temperature, as well as to abscisic acid treatments (20,21).…”

Activation of the Glucocorticoid Receptor Is Associated with Poor Prognosis in Estrogen Receptor-Negative Breast Cancer

“…To ensure the quality of the anti-GR antibody ChIP’d DNA, we performed quantitative real time PCR (Q-RT-PCR) as previously described (13) on the promoter regions of SGK1 and TSC22D3/GILZ genes containing established GR binding regions (17, 18). The primers for SGK1’s promoter regions were: 5’-CCCCTCCCTTCGCTTGTT-3’ (sense) and 5’-GGAAGAAGTACAATCTGCATTTCACT-3’ (antisense) (19) ; the primers for TSC22D3/GILZ’s promoter regions were: 5’-GATACCAGTTAAGCTCCTGA-3’ (sense) and 5’-AGGTGGGAGACAATAATGAT-3’ (antisense) (20).…”