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First published online 26 February 2008
doi: 10.1242/jcs.023077
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Research Article |
Institute of Plant Sciences and Zurich-Basel Plant Science Center, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, ETH Centre, CH-8092 Zurich, Switzerland
* Author for correspondence (e-mail: koehlerc{at}ethz.ch)
Accepted 8 January 2008
| Summary |
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Key words: Arabidopsis, Epigenetics, FERTILIZATION INDEPENDENT SEED genes, DNA methylation, Polycomb group proteins
| Introduction |
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In flowering plants, imprinting has only been detected in the endosperm, a terminal tissue that develops after fertilization of the central cell. In dicot species like Arabidopsis, the endosperm nourishes the embryo during its growth phase and is almost completely consumed during embryo development (Berger, 2003
). Thus far, only four imprinted genes have been identified in Arabidopsis. Three of them [MEDEA (MEA), FWA and FERTILIZATION INDEPENDENT SEED 2 (FIS2)] are maternally expressed and paternally silenced (Vielle-Calzada et al., 1999
; Kinoshita et al., 2004
; Jullien et al., 2006b
). The same paternally imprinted expression pattern applies to all imprinted genes that have been identified in maize (Scott and Spielman, 2006
). Paternal imprinting of MEA requires activity of the evolutionary conserved FIS-PcG complex, with MEA itself being a subunit of this complex. The FIS complex mediates trimethylation of histone H3 at the lysine residue at position 27 (H3K27me3) of the paternal MEA allele causing its repression (Baroux et al., 2006
; Gehring et al., 2006
; Jullien et al., 2006a
). Activation of the maternal MEA allele in the female gametophyte requires the 5-methylcytosine excising activity of the DNA glycosylase DEMETER (DME). DME acts antagonistically to the maintenance methyltransferase MET1 that methylates MEA in the promoter and 3' regions of the gene (Xiao et al., 2003
). DME activity is also necessary to activate expression of the paternally imprinted genes FWA and FIS2. Because MEA, FWA and FIS2 are only demethylated in the terminally differentiating endosperm, they remain heritably methylated throughout the life cycle of the plant (Xiao et al., 2003
; Kinoshita et al., 2004
; Jullien et al., 2006b
).
The promoter region of FWA and the 3' region of MEA contain tandem-repeat sequences that recruit de novo DNA methylation by the RNA-dependent DNA silencing pathway (Chan et al., 2006b
). Whereas FWA tandem repeats are necessary to establish FWA silencing (Chan et al., 2006b
), silencing of the paternal MEA allele is likely to be independent of the repeat sequences (Spillane et al., 2004
).
The type I MADS-box gene PHERES1 (PHE1) is the only plant gene known to be paternally expressed and maternally silenced. Maternal PHE1 silencing is caused by the repressing activity of the FIS complex (Köhler et al., 2005
). The FIS complex is active in the female gametophyte and in the endosperm, prevents precocious PHE1 expression before fertilization and restricts PHE1 expression to the chalazal domain of the endosperm after fertilization. The FIS complex is directly associated with the PHE1 locus and FIS repressive activity is correlated with H3K27me3 modification at PHE1 (Köhler et al., 2003
; Makarevich et al., 2006
). Upregulation of PHE1 in mea mutants is in part responsible for the mea mutant phenotype that can be alleviated by reducing PHE1 expression (Köhler et al., 2003
).
In this study, we asked whether FIS-mediated repression is sufficient for PHE1 imprinting or whether additional mechanisms are involved to repress the maternal PHE1 allele. Our data clearly show that imprinting is not a direct consequence of FIS-mediated repression but necessitates the presence of additional elements. We identified elements within the PHE1 3' region that are necessary for PHE1 imprinting and predict a model that explains how the FIS complex – together with the identified region – confers stable silencing of the maternal PHE1 allele.
| Results |
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Disruption of the PHE1 3' regions causes activation of the maternal PHE1 allele
Our results suggest that DNA methylation in the identified PHE1 3' region is important for PHE1 imprinting. In order to test this hypothesis we addressed the question whether disruption of the PHE1 3' region disrupts PHE1 imprinting. We identified a T-DNA mutant containing a 4 kb T-DNA insertion 441 bps downstream of the PHE1 stop codon (referred to as phe1-3) (Fig. 4A). Using this line, we could test whether an insertion within the 3' region disrupts PHE1 imprinting. We tested allele-specific expression of PHE1 in phe1-3 by performing reciprocal crosses of phe1-3 with C24 plants. Whereas expression of the paternal PHE1 allele was not affected in phe1-3 (Fig. 4B, upper panel and supplementary material Fig. S1C), we observed a drastic effect on the expression of the maternal allele when phe1-3 was used as the maternal parent (Fig. 4B lower panel and supplementary material Fig. S1C). In phe1-3 mutants, PHE1 was not maternally silenced but, in contrast to wild-type, which has only a weak expression of the maternal PHE1 allele, this allele was strongly expressed (Fig. 4B, lower panel). Surprisingly, we detected a decrease in the expression of the paternal PHE1 allele when phe1-3 was used as the maternal parent (cross phe1-3 x C24; Fig. 4B and supplementary material Fig. S1C). One possible explanation for this phenomenon might be the triploid nature of the endosperm consisting of two maternal versus one paternal genome copies. Therefore, if the two maternal PHE1 alleles become reactivated, they might outcompete expression of the single paternal PHE1 allele. We also considered the possibility that strong expression of the maternally derived PHE1 allele in phe1-3 is caused by de-repression of PHE1 in maternal sporophytic tissues of phe1-3 plants. Therefore, we tested expression of PHE1 in phe1-3 leaves. However, as shown in Fig. 4C, PHE1 remains as weakly expressed in phe1-3 leaves as in wild-type leaves. We further considered the possibility that transcripts derived from the T-DNA can influence PHE1 expression. To test this possibility, we performed northern blot analysis using probes flanking the insertion site. However, we did not obtain any expression signal with either of the probes, but detected a clear expression signal for the NEOMYCIN PHOSPHOTRANSFERASE II (NPTII) selection gene that is located within the T-DNA (Fig. 4D). Finally, we tested PHE1 imprinting in two additional transgenic lines containing a 4 kb T-DNA or a 6.6 kb Ds transposon insertion 1022 bps or 1168 bps after the PHE1 stop codon, respectively. The T-DNA in the insertion line (referred to as phe1-4) is inserted in the antisense orientation compared with the T-DNA of the phe1-3 allele, whereas insertion of the Ds element (referred to as phe1-5) is in the same orientation as phe1-3 (Fig. 4A). Consistent with the results obtained for the phe1-3 allele, we observed reactivation of the maternal PHE1 allele and a reduction of paternal PHE1 expression (Fig. 4E and supplementary material Fig. S1C), whereas we did not observe an effect on expression of the paternal PHE1 allele in those mutants (data not shown). Taken together, these results clearly demonstrate that the 3' region of PHE1 contains elements necessary for repression of the maternal PHE1 allele.
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Our results suggest that DNA methylation of the paternal PHE1 allele is necessary for paternal PHE1 expression (Fig. 2). To substantiate these findings we transformed the PHE13000::GUS_3' construct into a drm1/drm2 mutant background. DRM1 and DRM2 are necessary for de novo cytosine methylation in all known sequence contexts and are guided to their templates by small interfering (si) RNAs (Chan et al., 2004
). It has previously been demonstrated that transgene sequences when transformed into a drm1/drm2 mutant background remain unmethylated owing to lack of de novo methyltransferase activity (Chan et al., 2004
). Indeed, we did not detect significant levels of DNA methylation of the transgene in the drm1/drm2 mutant background (Fig. 5). Using this transformation assay allowed to directly address the question whether DNA methylation of the PHE13000::GUS_3' transgene affects PHE1 expression and avoids secondary effects caused by global DNA demethylation. We tested allele-specific PHE1 expression by crossing wild-type plants with pollen from drm1/drm2; PHE13000::GUS_3' transgenic lines. In none of the three tested independent transgenic lines did we detect expression of the paternally derived PHE13000::GUS_3' construct (Fig. 6C). Thus, DNA methylation of the 3' region of the paternal PHE1 allele is necessary for PHE1 expression. Taken together, our data clearly demonstrate that the PHE1 downstream region contains important sequence elements necessary for imprinting of PHE1.
| Discussion |
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Surprisingly, we detected expression of the maternal PHE1 alleles in seeds inheriting a hypomethylated paternal PHE1 allele. One possible explanation for this finding could involve recruitment of the FIS complex to the demethylated paternal PHE1 allele. If the number of FIS complexes is limited, additional FIS target genes could cause a reactivation of silenced maternal PHE1 alleles.
Is there a difference in DNA methylation between maternal and paternal alleles? We failed to solve this question for technical reasons, as it requires DNA isolation of either female gametophytes or pure endosperm tissues. However, given the presence of active DNA-demethylating enzymes in Arabidopsis, with DME having an assigned function of demethylation in the central cell, it is possible that PHE1 becomes demethylated in the central cell of the female gametophyte. DME is necessary for MEA and FIS2 expression, and lack of DME function causes seeds to abort with a fis-like phenotype. As MEA is necessary for repression of the maternal PHE1 allele, a direct function of DME for PHE1 regulation cannot be unequivocally addressed.
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Similar to the situation for PHE1, several imprinted genes in mammals depend on DNA demethylation for silencing, whereas DNA methylation is necessary for expression (Sleutels and Barlow, 2002
). Similar to the model proposed by Sleutels and Barlow (Sleutels and Barlow, 2002
), we assume that imprinting of PHE1 evolved in two steps. First, PHE1 expression became silenced by insertion of a repetitive sequence into a regulatory region located in the 3' region of the gene. In a second step this repetitive sequence became methylated, thereby causing restoration of PHE1 expression. Owing to a female-gamete-specific demethylation activity, the maternal PHE1 allele is silenced, whereas the paternal allele is methylated and active. This model makes two predictions, (1) removal of the insertion mutation that causes the silencing effect should reactivate the silenced allele and, (2) loss of DNA methylation should result in silencing. Indeed, both predictions are supported by the results presented in this study. We could demonstrate that removal of the PHE1 3' region causes de-repression of the maternal PHE1 allele and loss of DNA methylation causes silencing of the paternal PHE1 allele. The effect of DNA methylation to suppress the silencing effect of transposons has long been appreciated in plants (Martienssen, 1998
) and was probably used as a mechanism to achieve active PHE1 expression in male gametes.
| Materials and Methods |
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Plasmid constructs and generation of transgenic plants
To generate the PHE13000::GUS_3' construct, a 3000 bp sequence upstream of the PHE1 translational start and the PHE1-coding region were amplified by PCR, introducing EcoRI and XmaI restriction sites. The fragment was ligated into pCAMBIA1381Xc, creating an in-frame fusion with the GUS gene. Using EcoRI and BstEII sites, a fragment containing the PHE1 promoter, PHE1 coding region and the GUS gene was removed and introduced together with a fragment containing 3540 bps of PHE1 3' region flanked by BstEII and PstI sites into pCAMBIA 3300. The PHE13000::GUS_3' construct was introduced into homozygous drm1/drm2 plants and the corresponding Wassilewskija accession.
RNA extraction and qPCR analysis
RNA extraction and generation of cDNAs were performed as described previously (Köhler et al., 2005
). Quantitative PCR was done on an ABI Prism 7700 Sequence Detection System (Applied Biosystems) using SYBR Green PCR master mix (Applied Biosystems) according to the supplier's recommendations. The mean value of three replicates was normalized using ACTIN11 as control. The primers used in this study are specified in the supplementary material (Table S1).
Allele-specific expression analysis
Allele-specific PHE1 expression was analyzed using the assay described by (Köhler et al., 2005
). The amplified products were digested with HphI and analyzed on a 2.5% agarose gel. All primers are specified in the supplementary material (Table S1).
GUS expression analysis
Staining of seeds to detect GUS activity was done as described previously (Köhler et al., 2003
).
Northern and Southern blot analysis
Northern and Southern blot analyses were performed as described previously (Köhler et al., 2003
). Primers used to generate probes are specified in supplementary material Table S1.
Bisulfite sequencing
Bisulfite sequencing was performed following the protocol of (Jacobsen et al., 2000
). Used primers are specified in supplementary material Table S1. We sequenced six clones covering the regions of 1672-2144 bp (primers Fwd1 and Rev1) and 2099-2470 bp (primers Fwd2 and Rev2) and ten clones of the region 2425-2783 bp (primers Fwd3 and Rev3). We sequenced 12 clones covering the region 2099 bp-2470 bp (primers Fwd2 and Rev2) of transgenic lines containing the PHE13000::GUS_3' construct in wild-type and drm1/drm2-mutant background.
| Acknowledgments |
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| Footnotes |
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| References |
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