Chromatin Signaling and Diseases

Chromatin Signaling and Diseases covers the molecular mechanisms that regulate gene expression, which govern everything from embryonic development, growth, and human pathologies associated with aging, such as cancer. This book helps researchers learn about or keep up with the quickly expanding field of chromatin signaling.

After reading this book, clinicians will be more capable of explaining the mechanisms of gene expression regulation to their patients to reassure them about new drug developments that target chromatin signaling mechanisms. For example, several epigenetic drugs that act on chromatin signaling factors are in clinical trials or even approved for usage in cancer treatments, Alzheimer's, and Huntington's diseases. Other epigenetic drugs are in development to regulate various class of chromatin signaling factors. To keep up with this changing landscape, clinicians and doctors will need to stay familiar with genetic advances that translate to clinical practice, such as chromatin signaling.

Although sequencing of the human genome was completed over a decade ago and its structure investigated for nearly half a century, molecular mechanisms that regulate gene expression remain largely misunderstood. An emerging concept called chromatin signaling proposes that small protein domains recognize chemical modifications on the genome scaffolding histone proteins, facilitating the nucleation of enzymatic complexes at specific loci that then open up or shut down the access to genetic information, thereby regulating gene expression. The addition and removal of chemical modifications on histones, as well as the proteins that specifically recognize these, is reviewed in Chromatin Signaling and Diseases. Finally, the impact of gene expression defects associated with malfunctioning chromatin signaling is also explored.

Explains molecular mechanisms that regulate gene expression, which governs everything from embryonic development, growth, and human pathologies associated with agingEducates clinicians and researchers about chromatin signaling, a molecular mechanism that is changing our understanding of human pathologyExplores the addition and removal of chemical modifications on histones, the proteins that specifically recognize these, and the impact of gene expression defects associated with malfunctioning chromatin signalingHelps researchers learn about the quickly expanding field of chromatin signaling

Section I: Histone Mark Writers 1. Histone acetyltransferases, key writers of the epigenetic language Xiang-Jiao Yang

2. Impacts of histone lysine methylation on chromatin Sylvain Lanouette, John Haddad, Pamela Zhang and Jean-François Couture

3. The Role of Histone Mark Writers in Chromatin Signaling: Protein Arginine Methyltransferases Nasim Haghandish and Jocelyn Côté

4. Histone Kinases and Phosphatases Nikolaus A. Watson, Jonathan M.G. Higgins

Section II: Histone Mark Readers 5. The Bromodomain as Acetyl-Lysine Readers Steven G. Smith, and Ming-Ming Zhou

6. Chromo domain proteins Joel C. Eissenberg

7. The role of PHD fingers in chromatin signaling: mechanisms and functional consequences of the recognition of histone and non-histone targets Emma A. Morrison and Catherine A. Musselman

8. Tudor domains as methyl-lysine and methyl-arginine readers Maria Victoria Botuyan and Georges Mer

Section III: Histone Mark Erasers 9. Histone deacetylase, the erasers of the code María Julia Lamberti, Emanuel Renzo Vera, Natalia Rumie Vittar Belén, Güenter Schneider

10. Lysine Demethylases: Structure, Function and Disfunction María Alejandra García, Raquel Fueyo, and Marian A. Martínez-Balbás

Section IV: Chromatin Signaling 11. Variation, modification and reorganization of broken chromatin Timothy C. Humphrey, Jessica A. Downs, and Anna L. Chambers

12. Cross-talk between histone modifications integrates various signaling inputs to fine tune transcriptional output Sankari Nagarajan and Steven A. Johnsen

13. Signaling and Chromatin Networks in Cancer Biology Elisabeth Hessmann, Raul Urrutia, and Alexander Koenig

Section V: Chromatin Dynamics in Normal and Disease Conditions 14. Crosstalk between DNA methylation and Chromatin Structure María Roqué and Laura Vargas-Roig   15. Epigenetic regulation of endoplasmic reticulum stress Kim Barroso and Eric Chevet

16. Chromatin Signaling in Aging and Cellular Senescense Florence Couteau and Frédérick A. Mallette

17.Chromatin Dynamics and Epigenetics of Stem Cells and Stem-Like Cancer Cells Alexandre Gaspar-Maia and Ana Sevilla

18. Altered Chromatin Signaling in Cancer Andrew Liss

19. Impact of Chromatin Changes in Pathogenesis of Infectious Disease: A Pathogen View Andrea Ropolo and Maria Carolina Touz

20. Chromatin Remodeling and Epigenetic Reprogramming In Chronic Disease and Cancer in the Liver and Pancreas Maite G. Fernandez - Barrena and Christopher L. Pin

21. Pharmacological and Therapeutic Targeting of Epigenetic Regulators Raul Urrutia and Gwen A. Lomberk

22. Use of Chromatin Changes as Biomarkers Ryan A. Hlady and Keith D. Robertson

23. Regulation of Host Chromatin by Bacterial Metabolites Sridhar Mani