H-NS can facilitate specific DNA-binding by RNA polymerase in AT-rich gene regulatory regions

Extremely AT-rich DNA sequences present a challenging template for specific recognition by RNA polymerase. In bacteria, this is because the promoter -10 hexamer, the major DNA element recognised by RNA polymerase, is itself AT-rich. We show that Histone-like Nucleoid Structuring (H-NS) protein can f...

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Veröffentlicht in:PLoS genetics 2013-06, Vol.9 (6), p.e1003589-e1003589
Hauptverfasser: Singh, Shivani S, Grainger, David C
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Sprache:eng
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Zusammenfassung:Extremely AT-rich DNA sequences present a challenging template for specific recognition by RNA polymerase. In bacteria, this is because the promoter -10 hexamer, the major DNA element recognised by RNA polymerase, is itself AT-rich. We show that Histone-like Nucleoid Structuring (H-NS) protein can facilitate correct recognition of a promoter by RNA polymerase in AT-rich gene regulatory regions. Thus, at the Escherichia coli ehxCABD operon, RNA polymerase is unable to distinguish between the promoter -10 element and similar overlapping sequences. This problem is resolved in native nucleoprotein because the overlapping sequences are masked by H-NS. Our work provides mechanistic insight into nucleoprotein structure and its effect on protein-DNA interactions in prokaryotic cells.
ISSN:1553-7404
1553-7390
1553-7404
DOI:10.1371/journal.pgen.1003589