Nuclear organization: uniting replication foci, chromatin domains and chromosome structure.

Abstract

In higher eukaryotes, 'replication factories' coordinate DNA synthesis within local clusters of chromatin domains. Recent experiments (1, 2) have confirmed the complexity of these clusters and established that the organization of sites labelled during S phase persists throughout the cell cycle. This implies that domain clusters are critical elements of an hierarchy that is fundamental to both nuclear and chromosome structure.