Project description:Many heavy metals, including nickel (Ni), cadmium (Cd), and chromium (Cr) are toxic industrial chemicals with an exposure risk in both occupational and environmental settings that may cause harmful outcomes. While these substances are known to produce adverse health effects leading to disease or health problems, the detailed mechanisms remain unclear. To elucidate the processes involved in the of toxicity of nickel, cadmium, and chromium at the molecular level and to perform a comparative analysis, H4-II-E-C3 rat liver-derived cell lines were treated with soluble salts of each metal using concentrations derived from viability assays, and gene expression patterns were determined with DNA microarrays. We identified both common and unique biological responses to exposure to the three metals. Nickel, cadmium, chromium all induced oxidative stress with both similar and unique genes and pathways responding to this stress. Although all three metals are known to be genotoxic, evidence for DNA damage in our study only exists in response to chromium. Nickel induced a hypoxic response as well as inducing genes involved in chromatin structure, perhaps by replacing iron in key proteins. Cadmium distinctly perturbed genes related to endoplasmic reticulum stress and invoked the unfolded protein response leading to apoptosis. With these studies, we have completed the first gene expression comparative analysis of nickel, cadmium, and chromium in H4-II-E-C3 cells.
Project description:High temporal resolution RNAseq timecourse of mouse ES differentiation Investigations of transcriptional responses during developmental transitions typically use time courses with intervals that are not commensurate with the timescales of known biological processes. Moreover, such experiments typically focus on protein-coding transcripts, ignoring the important impact of long noncoding RNAs. We evaluated coding and noncoding expression dynamics at unprecedented temporal resolution (6-hourly) in differentiating mouse embryonic stem cells and report the effects of increased temporal resolution on the characterization of the underlying molecular processes.
Project description:Many heavy metals, including nickel (Ni), cadmium (Cd), and chromium (Cr) are toxic industrial chemicals with an exposure risk in both occupational and environmental settings that may cause harmful outcomes. While these substances are known to produce adverse health effects leading to disease or health problems, the detailed mechanisms remain unclear. To elucidate the processes involved in the of toxicity of nickel, cadmium, and chromium at the molecular level and to perform a comparative analysis, H4-II-E-C3 rat liver-derived cell lines were treated with soluble salts of each metal using concentrations derived from viability assays, and gene expression patterns were determined with DNA microarrays. We identified both common and unique biological responses to exposure to the three metals. Nickel, cadmium, chromium all induced oxidative stress with both similar and unique genes and pathways responding to this stress. Although all three metals are known to be genotoxic, evidence for DNA damage in our study only exists in response to chromium. Nickel induced a hypoxic response as well as inducing genes involved in chromatin structure, perhaps by replacing iron in key proteins. Cadmium distinctly perturbed genes related to endoplasmic reticulum stress and invoked the unfolded protein response leading to apoptosis. With these studies, we have completed the first gene expression comparative analysis of nickel, cadmium, and chromium in H4-II-E-C3 cells. H4-II-E-C3 cells were were exposed to nickel (II) chloride (NiCl2), cadmium chloride (CdCl2), or sodium dichromate (Na2Cr2O7) for 24 hours. The cells were treated with a low, mid, and high concentration of each chemical and shared a control for each biological replicated, and we exposed 4 biologcial replicates for a total of 44 samples.
Project description:The ability of chromatin to switch back and forth from open euchromatin to closed heterochromatin is vital for transcriptional regulation and genomic stability, and subject to disruption by exposure to environmental agents such as hexavalent chromium. Cr(VI) exposure can cause chromosomal disruption through formation of Cr-DNA adducts, free radical-induced DNA damage, and DNA-Cr-protein and DNA-Cr-DNA cross-links, all of which may disrupt chromatin remodeling mechanisms responsible for maintenance or controlled modification of epigenetic homeostasis. In addition, dose-response analyses have shown that acute exposures to high-concentrations of Cr(VI) and chronic exposures to low-concentrations of the same agent lead to significantly different transcriptomic and genomic stability outcomes. To investigate how transcriptional responses to chromium exposure might correlate to structural changes in chromatin, we have used whole genome Formaldehyde-Assisted Isolation of Regulatory Elements (FAIRE) analysis coupled with deep sequencing to identify regions of the genome that switch from open to closed chromatin or vice versa in response to exposure to varying Cr(VI) concentrations. We find that the switch affects gene expression levels in the target areas that vary depending on Cr(VI) concentration. At either Cr(VI) concentration, chromatin domains surrounding binding sites for AP-1 transcription factors become significantly open, treatment whereas BACH2 and CTCF binding sites are open solely at the low and high concentrations, respectively. Our results suggest that FAIRE may be a useful technique to map chromatin elements targeted by DNA damaging agents for which there is no prior knowledge of their specificity, and to identify subsequent transcriptomic changes induced by those agents.
