Cell
Volume 134, Issue 4, 22 August 2008, Pages 599-609
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Article
A Sequence Motif within Chromatin Entry Sites Directs MSL Establishment on the Drosophila X Chromosome

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Summary

The Drosophila MSL complex associates with active genes specifically on the male X chromosome to acetylate histone H4 at lysine 16 and increase expression approximately 2-fold. To date, no DNA sequence has been discovered to explain the specificity of MSL binding. We hypothesized that sequence-specific targeting occurs at “chromatin entry sites,” but the majority of sites are sequence independent. Here we characterize 150 potential entry sites by ChIP-chip and ChIP-seq and discover a GA-rich MSL recognition element (MRE). The motif is only slightly enriched on the X chromosome (∼2-fold), but this is doubled when considering its preferential location within or 3′ to active genes (>4-fold enrichment). When inserted on an autosome, a newly identified site can direct local MSL spreading to flanking active genes. These results provide strong evidence for both sequence-dependent and -independent steps in MSL targeting of dosage compensation to the male X chromosome.

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These authors contributed equally to this work