Cited by 290Stress Responses and CortisolEpigenetics and DNA MethylationGenomics and Chromatin Dynamics

Regulation of hippocampal H3 histone methylation by acute and chronic stress

Open access
Hunter, Richard G., McCarthy, Katharine J., Milne, Thomas A., Pfaff, Donald W., McEwen, Bruce S.·2009·Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Abstract

The hippocampal formation is a brain region noted for its plasticity in response to stressful events and adrenal steroid hormones. Recent work has shown that chromatin remodeling in various brain regions, including the hippocampus, is associated with the effects of stress in a variety of models. We chose to examine the effects of stress, stress duration, corticosterone administration, and fluoxetine treatment on the levels of hippocampal histone H3 methylation at lysines 4, 9, and 27, marks associated, respectively, with active transcription, heterochromatin formation, and transcriptional repression. We found that acute stress increased the levels of H3K9 tri-methylation (H3K9me3) in the dentate gyrus (DG) and CA1, while it reduced levels of H3K9 mono-methylation (H3K9me1) and H3K27 tri-methylation (H3K27me3) in the same regions, and had no effect on levels of H3K4 tri-methylation (H3K4me3). Seven days of restraint stress reduced levels of H3K4me3 in the CA1 and H3K27me3 in the DG and CA1, while increasing basal levels of H3K9me3. Chronic restraint stress (CRS) for 21 days mildly increased levels of H3K4me3 and reduced H3K9me3 levels in the DG. Treatment with fluoxetine during CRS reversed the decrease in DG H3K9me3, but had no effect on the other marks. These results show a complex, surprisingly rapid, and regionally specific pattern of chromatin remodeling within hippocampus produced by stress and anti-depressant treatment that may open an avenue of understanding the interplay of stress and hippocampal gene expression, and reveal the outlines of a potential chromatin stress response that may be diminished or degraded by chronic stress.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1073/pnas.0911143106

Cites

60 of 60 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • Reduced levels of H3K9me3 were detected in rats subjected to chronic restraint stress, a finding that was reversed on administration of the antidepressant fluoxetine.

    “Reduced levels of H3K9me3 was detected, a finding that was reversed on administration of the antidepressant fluoxetine, though neither gene expression changes nor anxiety phenotype were measured (Hunter et al., 2009).”
  • In rodents, chronic stress affects the total levels of acetylated histones in certain limbic regions.

    “In rodents, chronic stress affects the total levels of acetylated histones in certain limbic regions.”

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Hunter, R. G., McCarthy, K. J., Milne, T. A., Pfaff, D. W., & McEwen, B. S.
Affiliations
  • Rockefeller University (US)
  • Laboratory of Neuroendocrinology,
  • Laboratory of Neurobiology and Behavior, and
Venue
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Published
2009-12-08
Volume
106
Issue
49
Pages
20912-20917
ISSN
  • 0027-8424 (ISSN-L)
  • 1091-6490
OpenAlex
W1972943884
Cited by
290
References
60
Citations by year
2026: 7 · 2025: 7 · 2024: 11 · 2023: 6 · 2022: 18 · 2021: 23 · 2020: 12 · 2019: 17 · 2018: 21 · 2017: 23 · 2016: 29 · 2015: 20 · 2014: 27 · 2013: 18 · 2012: 19
FWCI
6.48
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (publishedVersion)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
Funders
  • Barnard College
  • National Institutes of Health (MH41256)
  • National Institute of Mental Health (MH-41256, MH-15125, R37MH041256, T32MH015125, R01MH041256)
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Behavioral Neuroscience › Stress Responses and Cortisol
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Epigenetics and DNA Methylation
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Genomics and Chromatin Dynamics
Keywords
hippocampus, histone H3 methylation, acute stress, chronic restraint stress, H3K4me3, H3K9me3, H3K27me3, chromatin remodeling, fluoxetine, corticosterone, dentate gyrus, CA1, antidepressant treatment, stress response, transcriptional repression, heterochromatin
MeSH terms
Acute Disease, Animals, Chronic Disease, Fluoxetine, Hippocampus, Histones, Lysine, Male, Methylation, Restraint, Physical, Stress, Psychological, Rats, Sprague-Dawley, Dentate Gyrus, Rats

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review