The pioneer factor OCT4 requires BRG1 to functionally mature gene regulatory elements in mouse embryonic stem cells

  1. Hamish W King
  2. Robert J Klose  Is a corresponding author
  1. University of Oxford, United Kingdom

Abstract

Pioneer transcription factors recognise and bind their target sequences in inaccessible chromatin to establish new transcriptional networks during development and cellular reprogramming. During this process, pioneer factors establish an accessible chromatin state to facilitate additional transcription factor binding, yet how different pioneer factors achieve this remains unclear. Here, we discover that the pluripotency-associated pioneer factor OCT4 binds chromatin to shape accessibility, transcription factor co-binding, and regulatory element function in mouse embryonic stem cells. Chromatin accessibility at OCT4-bound sites requires the chromatin remodeller BRG1, which is recruited to these sites by OCT4. BRG1 occupancy supports transcription factor binding and expression of the pluripotency-associated transcriptome. Furthermore, the requirement for BRG1 in shaping OCT4 binding reflects how these target sites are used during cellular reprogramming and early mouse development. Together this reveals a distinct requirement for a chromatin remodeller in shaping the activity of the pioneer factor OCT4 and regulating the pluripotency network.

Data availability

The following data sets were generated
The following previously published data sets were used
    1. ENCODE DCC
    (2014) A comparative encyclopedia of DNA elements in the mouse genome
    Publicly available at the NCBI Gene Expression Omnibus (accession no: GSE49847).

Article and author information

Author details

  1. Hamish W King

    Department of Biochemistry, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0001-5972-8926
  2. Robert J Klose

    Department of Biochemistry, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
    For correspondence
    rob.klose@bioch.ox.ac.uk
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0002-8726-7888

Funding

Wellcome (098024/Z/11/Z)

  • Robert J Klose

European Research Council (681440)

  • Robert J Klose

Exeter College, University of Oxford (Monsanto Senior Research Fellowship)

  • Robert J Klose

Lister Institute of Preventive Medicine

  • Robert J Klose

The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.

Reviewing Editor

  1. Irwin Davidson, Institut de Génétique et de Biologie Moléculaire et Cellulaire, France

Version history

  1. Received: October 26, 2016
  2. Accepted: March 9, 2017
  3. Accepted Manuscript published: March 13, 2017 (version 1)
  4. Accepted Manuscript updated: March 15, 2017 (version 2)
  5. Version of Record published: April 21, 2017 (version 3)

Copyright

© 2017, King & Klose

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.

Metrics

  • 10,065
    views
  • 1,565
    downloads
  • 153
    citations

Views, downloads and citations are aggregated across all versions of this paper published by eLife.

Download links

A two-part list of links to download the article, or parts of the article, in various formats.

Downloads (link to download the article as PDF)

Open citations (links to open the citations from this article in various online reference manager services)

Cite this article (links to download the citations from this article in formats compatible with various reference manager tools)

  1. Hamish W King
  2. Robert J Klose
(2017)
The pioneer factor OCT4 requires BRG1 to functionally mature gene regulatory elements in mouse embryonic stem cells
eLife 6:e22631.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.22631

Share this article

https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.22631

Further reading

    1. Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine
    Magali Seguret, Patricia Davidson ... Jean-Sébastien Hulot
    Research Article

    We developed a 96-well plate assay which allows fast, reproducible, and high-throughput generation of 3D cardiac rings around a deformable optically transparent hydrogel (polyethylene glycol [PEG]) pillar of known stiffness. Human induced pluripotent stem cell-derived cardiomyocytes, mixed with normal human adult dermal fibroblasts in an optimized 3:1 ratio, self-organized to form ring-shaped cardiac constructs. Immunostaining showed that the fibroblasts form a basal layer in contact with the glass, stabilizing the muscular fiber above. Tissues started contracting around the pillar at D1 and their fractional shortening increased until D7, reaching a plateau at 25±1%, that was maintained up to 14 days. The average stress, calculated from the compaction of the central pillar during contractions, was 1.4±0.4 mN/mm2. The cardiac constructs recapitulated expected inotropic responses to calcium and various drugs (isoproterenol, verapamil) as well as the arrhythmogenic effects of dofetilide. This versatile high-throughput assay allows multiple in situ mechanical and structural readouts.

    1. Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine
    Shintaro Watanuki, Hiroshi Kobayashi ... Keiyo Takubo
    Research Article

    Metabolic pathways are plastic and rapidly change in response to stress or perturbation. Current metabolic profiling techniques require lysis of many cells, complicating the tracking of metabolic changes over time after stress in rare cells such as hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs). Here, we aimed to identify the key metabolic enzymes that define differences in glycolytic metabolism between steady-state and stress conditions in murine HSCs and elucidate their regulatory mechanisms. Through quantitative 13C metabolic flux analysis of glucose metabolism using high-sensitivity glucose tracing and mathematical modeling, we found that HSCs activate the glycolytic rate-limiting enzyme phosphofructokinase (PFK) during proliferation and oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS) inhibition. Real-time measurement of ATP levels in single HSCs demonstrated that proliferative stress or OXPHOS inhibition led to accelerated glycolysis via increased activity of PFKFB3, the enzyme regulating an allosteric PFK activator, within seconds to meet ATP requirements. Furthermore, varying stresses differentially activated PFKFB3 via PRMT1-dependent methylation during proliferative stress and via AMPK-dependent phosphorylation during OXPHOS inhibition. Overexpression of Pfkfb3 induced HSC proliferation and promoted differentiated cell production, whereas inhibition or loss of Pfkfb3 suppressed them. This study reveals the flexible and multilayered regulation of HSC glycolytic metabolism to sustain hematopoiesis under stress and provides techniques to better understand the physiological metabolism of rare hematopoietic cells.