The aim of this paper is to review the data in the literature concerning ribonucleoprotein components during apoptosis, where a major rearrangement of RNPs takes place. In parallel with chromatin changes, the nucleoplasmic constituents (perichromatin fibrils; perichromatin granules; interchromatin granules and nuclear bodies) as well as the nucleoli aggregate into heterogeneous clusters called HERDS, in the interchromatin space. Later, these RNP-containing structures are extruded from the nucleus and leave the cell within cytoplasmic blebs. We propose also a role for HERDS as markers of irreversible transcriptional arrest. © 2004 Elsevier SAS. All rights reserved.Keywords: Electron microscopy; HERDS; Immunocytochemistry; Nuclear ribonucleoproteins; Transcription
The cell nucleus during apoptosis: an introductionThe basic functions of the nucleus such as replication, transcription, DNA repair and their timing, as well as the correct sorting of information need an architectural support; this support, however, needs not to be a stable structural one only, but preferably derived from the dynamic interaction of many different components to be -at the same time-flexible and stable enough for these processes to proceed (Marshall, 2002;Stein et al., 2003).The nucleus is compartmentalized, both structurally and functionally and, in fact, may be considered as composed of at least two largely interacting parts: chromatin and the ribonucleoprotein (RNP)-containing structures. Already during the sixties of the last century, Bernhard and co-workers (Bernhard, 1969;Monneron and Bernhard, 1969; Bernhard, 1971,1973) showed that, thanks to a rather simple ultrastructural technique based on treatment with EDTA, condensed chromatin may be quite efficiently bleached whereas the interchromatin space becomes more contrasted. Under these conditions, it was possible -for the very first time-to detect and describe in detail some RNP-based structures. Those pioneering papers have then been followed by a plethora of articles aimed at elucidating the organization, chemical composition and functional significance of nuclear RNPs (for a recent review, see Fakan, 2004, and Table 1). One specific region (or domain), perichromatin compartment, is of particular interest since it is the place where most of the functions related to transcription, splicing and gene silencing are located (Cmarko et al., 2003).It is now widely accepted that, in eukaryotic cells, nuclear RNPs are part of the transcription and splicing machinery, and are always organized as morphologically recognizable structures (as schematically reported in Fig. 1a); at the electron microscope, these structures have been described as perichromatin fibrils (PF), perichromatin granules (PG), and interchromatin granules (IG) (Fakan, 1994;Spector, 1996), and nucleolus (Raška et al., 2004, in this issue). These structures are characterized by the presence of some marker proteins, such as hnRNP core proteins in PF (Martin and Okamura, 1981;Fakan et al., 1984), SC-35, Sm and PANA ...