Paternal poly (ADP-ribose) metabolism modulates retention of inheritable sperm histones and early embryonic gene expression.

ABSTRACT: To achieve the extreme nuclear condensation necessary for sperm function, most histones are replaced with protamines during spermiogenesis in mammals. Mature sperm retain only a small fraction of nucleosomes, which are, in part, enriched on gene regulatory sequences, and recent findings suggest that these retained histones provide epigenetic information that regulates expression of a subset of genes involved in embryo development after fertilization. We addressed this tantalizing hypothesis by analyzing two mouse models exhibiting abnormal histone positioning in mature sperm due to impaired poly(ADP-ribose) (PAR) metabolism during spermiogenesis and identified altered sperm histone retention in specific gene loci genome-wide using MNase digestion-based enrichment of mononucleosomal DNA. We

SUBMITTER: Ihara M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4014456 | biostudies-literature | 2014 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature