Polarity and Chirality in NCP Mesophases and Chromatin Fibers

We propose a unified mechanism of phase transitions in the high density solutions of Nucleosomal Core Particles. We demonstrate its relation with the high shape and charge anisotropy of the NCP due to the DNA wrapping around the histone protein core. Hexagonal-to-lamellar transition in the solution of NCP columnar aggregates is shown to be driven by the condensation of the periodic antiparallel polar vector field. The transition results in the polar dyadic axes correlations. Fine structure of the NCP organization is also explained, namely the correlated tilting of NCP with respect to the column axis.

• Publication year

  2007

• Venue

  Molecular Crystals and Liquid Crystals

• Publication date

  2007-12-14

• Fields of study

  Chemistry, Materials Science, Physics

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1080/15421400701686918
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

• Are liquid crystalline properties of nucleosomes involved in chromosome structure and dynamics?

  2006cited by this paper
• X-ray structure of a tetranucleosome and its implications for the chromatin fibre

  2005cited by this paper
• Nucleosome and chromatin fiber dynamics.

  2005cited by this paper
• Two-body polyelectrolyte-mediated bridging interactions

  2003cited by this paper
• Chromatin fiber folding: requirement for the histone H4 N-terminal tail.

  2003cited by this paper
• X-ray diffraction characterization of the dense phases formed by nucleosome core particles.

  2003cited by this paper
• Rb-mediated heterochromatin formation and silencing of E2F target genes during cellular senescence.

  2003cited by this paper
• Phase diagram of nucleosome core particles.

  2003cited by this paper
• Histone acetylation: a switch between repressive and permissive chromatin

  2002cited by this paper
• Coupling of DNA Synthesis and Histone Synthesis in S Phase Independent of Cyclin/cdk2 Activity

  2002cited by this paper
• Bilayers of nucleosome core particles.

  2001cited by this paper
• Positional, reorientational, and bond orientational order in DNA mesophases.

  2001cited by this paper
• Protein modules that manipulate histone tails for chromatin regulation

  2001cited by this paper
• Structure, dynamics, and function of chromatin in vitro.

  1998cited by this paper
• Histone acetylation in chromatin structure and transcription

  1997cited by this paper
• Crystal structure of the nucleosome core particle at 2.8 Å resolution

  1997cited by this paper
• Phase transitions and crystal symmetry

  1990cited by this paper
• The Landau theory of phase transitions : application to structural, incommensurate, magnetic, and liquid crystal systems

  1987cited by this paper
• Structure of the 3000Å chromatin filament: X-ray diffraction from oriented samples

  1985cited by this paper
• Low angle x-ray diffraction studies of chromatin structure in vivo and in isolated nuclei and metaphase chromosomes

  1983cited by this paper
• X-ray studies on "native" chromatin.

  1977cited by this paper
• Symmetry in Physics

  1969cited by this paper

• The Influence of Ionic Environment and Histone Tails on Ordered Columnar Phases of Nucleosome Core Particles

  2018cites this paper
• The Influence of Ionic Environment and Histone Tails on Columnar Order of Nucleosome Core Particles.

  2016cites this paper