Nucleosome stability safeguards cell identity, stress resilience and healthy aging.

ABSTRACT: Nucleosomes are the minimal repeating units of chromatin. Their dynamic assembly and disassembly underpins chromatin organization and genome regulation. However, it remains unclear how intrinsic nucleosome stability contributes to higher-level yet fundamental cellular and organismal properties-such as preservation of cell identity, lineage specification, stress resilience and ultimately healthy aging. To address this, we tested the impact of decreased intrinsic nucleosome stability across multiple cell, tissue and organismal models by introducing histone mutants that weaken histone-histone interactions. While nucleosome instability did not broadly alter global chromatin accessibility, DNA damage, cell proliferation or viability, it impaired lineage-specific gene expression programs, altere

SUBMITTER: Tanaka H 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12458469 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature