Senescent mouse cells fail to overtly regulate the HIRA histone chaperone and do not form robust Senescence Associated Heterochromatin Foci.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Cellular senescence is a permanent growth arrest that occurs in response to cellular stressors, such as telomere shortening or activation of oncogenes. Although the process of senescence growth arrest is somewhat conserved between mouse and human cells, there are some critical differences in the molecular pathways of senescence between these two species. Recent studies in human fibroblasts have defined a cell signaling pathway that is initiated by repression of a specific Wnt ligand, Wnt2. This, in turn, activates a histone chaperone HIRA, and culminates in formation of specialized punctate domains of facultative heterochromatin, called Senescence-Associated Heterochromatin Foci (SAHF), that are enriched in the histone variant, macroH2A. SAHF are thought to repress expre

SUBMITTER: Kennedy AL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2904742 | biostudies-literature | 2010 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature