Information display by transcriptional enhancers
Abstract
Transcriptional enhancers integrate positional and temporal information to regulate the complex expression of developmentally controlled genes. Current models suggest that enhancers act as computational devices, receiving multiple inputs from activators and repressors and resolving them into a single positive or a negative signal that is transmitted to the basal transcriptional machinery. We show that a simple, compact enhancer is capable of representing both repressed and activated states at the same time and in the same nucleus. This finding suggests that closely apposed factor binding sites, situated within compact cis-elements, can be independently interpreted by the transcriptional machinery, possibly through successive enhancer-promoter interactions. These results provide clear evidence that the computational functions usually ascribed to the enhancer itself are actually shared with the basal machinery. In contrast to the autonomous computer model of enhancer function, an information-display or `billboard' model of enhancer activity may better describe many developmentally regulated transcriptional enhancers.
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Later studies of Drosophila developmental enhancers found evidence for much less rigid motif organisation.
“In contrast, later studies of Drosophila developmental enhancers found evidence for much less rigid motif organisation [90, 91].”
From Transcriptional enhancers and their communication with gene promoters (2021) · cites this paper as [90]
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Transcriptional enhancers and their communication with gene promoters
Ray-Jones, H., & Spivakov, M. (2021) · Cellular and Molecular Life Sciences · doi:10.1007/s00018-021-03903-w · Cited by 81 · see citing works
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- Authors
- Kulkarni, M. M., & Arnosti, D. N.
- Affiliations
- Michigan State University (US)
- Corresponding author
- Arnosti, David N.
- ORCID
- Arnosti, David N.
- Venue
- Development
- Publisher
- The Company of Biologists
- Published
- 2003-12-29
- Volume
- 130
- Issue
- 26
- Pages
- 6569-6575
- ISSN
- 0950-1991 (ISSN-L)
- 1477-9129
- OpenAlex
- W2082874386
- Cited by
- 118
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 4 · 2025: 7 · 2024: 12 · 2023: 4 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 11 · 2020: 11 · 2019: 2 · 2018: 1 · 2017: 6 · 2016: 4 · 2015: 4 · 2014: 8 · 2013: 7 · 2012: 9
- FWCI
- 1.04
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Development (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Institute of General Medical Sciences (R01GM056976, GM56976)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Genomics and Chromatin Dynamics
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Developmental Biology and Gene Regulation
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Gene Regulatory Network Analysis
- Keywords
- enhancers, enhancer-promoter interactions, cis-regulatory elements, transcriptional regulation, developmental gene expression, basal transcription machinery
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Blastoderm, Enhancer Elements, Genetic, Gene Expression Regulation, Models, Genetic, Transcription, Genetic, Mutagenesis, Insertional, Genes, Reporter
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