Distinctive and complementary roles of E2F transcription factors during plant replication stress responses

Survival of living organisms is fully dependent on their maintenance of genome integrity,being permanently threatened by replication stress in proliferating cells.Although the plant DNA damage response(DDR)regulator SOG1 has been demonstrated to cope with replication defects,accumulating evidence points to other pathways functioning independent of SOG1.Here,we report the roles of the Arabidopsis E2FA and EF2B transcription factors,two well-characterized regulators of DNA replication,in plant response to replication stress.Through a combination of reverse genetics and chromatin immunoprecipitation approaches,we show that E2FA and E2FB share many target genes with SOG1,providing evidence for their involvement in the DDR.Analysis of double-and triple-mutant combinations revealed that E2FB,rather than E2FA,plays the most prominent role in sustaining plant growth in the presence of replication defects,either operating antagonistically or synergistically with SOG1.Conversely,SOG1 aids in overcoming the replication defects of E2FA/E2FB-deficient plants.Collectively,our data reveal a complex transcriptional network controlling the replication stress response in which E2Fs and SOG1 act as key regulatory factors.

The LEAFY floral regulator displays pioneer transcription factor properties

Pioneer transcription factors(TFs)are a special category of TFs with the capacity to bind to closed chromatin regions in which DNA is wrapped around histones and may be highly methylated.Subsequently,pioneer TFs are able to modify the chromatin state to initiate gene expression.In plants,LEAFY(LFY)is a master floral regulator and has been suggested to act as a pioneer TF in Arabidopsis.Here,we demonstrate that LFY is able to bind both methylated and non-methylated DNA using a combination of in vitro genomewide binding experiments and structural modeling.Comparisons between regions bound by LFY in vivo and chromatin accessibility data suggest that a subset of LFY bound regions is occupied by nucleosomes.We confirm that LFY is able to bind nucleosomal DNA in vitro using reconstituted nucleosomes.Finally,we show that constitutive LFY expression in seedling tissues is sufficient to induce chromatin accessibility in the LFY direct target genes APETALA1 and AGAMOUS.Taken together,our study suggests that LFY possesses key pioneer TF features that contribute to launching the floral gene expression program.