Abstract
Nuclear pore complexes (NPCs) are canonically known to regulate nucleocytoplasmic transport. However, research efforts over the last decade have demonstrated that NPCs and their constituent nucleoporins (Nups) also interact with the genome and perform important roles in regulation of gene expression. It has become increasingly clear that many Nups execute these roles specifically through regulation of chromatin state, whether through interactions with histone modifiers and downstream changes in post-translational histone modifications, or through relationships with chromatin-remodeling proteins that can result in physical changes in nucleosome occupancy and chromatin compaction. This review focuses on these findings, highlighting the functional connection between NPCs/Nups and regulation of chromatin structure, and how this connection can manifest in regulation of transcription.
Highlights
Nuclear pore complexes (NPCs), composed of ~30 distinct Nucleoporins (Nups), are the main mode of nucleocytoplasmic transport in eukaryotic cells
This evolutionarily conserved relationship between Elys homologues and chromatin remodelers may help provide a possible mechanism for the long-observed zones of heterochromatin exclusion at NPCs at the nuclear periphery, and offer another mechanism by which NPCs/Nups are capable of regulating transcriptional states
We hope that the above summary of the chromatin-related roles of NPC components will help draw attention to the clear importance of Nups in regulation of chromatin itself, and that these findings may be kept in mind while examining future research as the field of Nups in regulation of gene expression continues to be explored
Summary
Nuclear pore complexes (NPCs), composed of ~30 distinct Nucleoporins (Nups), are the main mode of nucleocytoplasmic transport in eukaryotic cells. Since early characterization of NPCs via electron microscopy (EM) in the late 1950s, “intranuclear channels” could be seen extending from nuclear pores into the nucleoplasm [1]. Interactions between Nups and the genome have been shown to occur “off-pore”, taking place in the nuclear interior in metazoan cells [11,12,13,14] This is likely due to the dynamic behavior of certain Nups, which have been shown to have low residence times at nuclear pores and to have intranuclear presence [15,16]. We take an expanded examination of research on the relationship between NPC components and chromatin structure, which can manifest at NPCs themselves or at intranuclear locations, and conclude with a survey of some of the recent updates on transcriptional regulation by Nups
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