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Identification of a crenarchaeal orthologue of Elf1: implications for chromatin and transcription in Archaea

Jan-Peter Daniels1, Steven Kelly3,1,2, Bill Wickstead1 and Keith Gull1*

Author Affiliations

1 Sir William Dunn School of Pathology, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3RE, UK

2 Centre for Mathematical Biology, University of Oxford, 24-29 St Giles', Oxford, OX1 3LB , UK

3 Oxford Centre for Interactive Systems Biology, Department of Biochemistry, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3QU, UK

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Biology Direct 2009, 4:24 doi:10.1186/1745-6150-4-24

Published: 29 July 2009

Abstract

The transcription machineries of Archaea and eukaryotes are similar in many aspects, but little is understood about archaeal chromatin and its role in transcription. Here, we describe the identification in hyperthermophilic Crenarchaeota and a Korarchaeon of an orthologue of the eukaryotic transcription elongation factor Elf1, which has been shown to function in chromatin structure maintenance of actively transcribed templates. Our discovery has implications for the relationship of chromatin and transcription in Archaea and the evolution of these processes in eukaryotes.

Reviewers

This article was reviewed by Chris P. Ponting and Eugene V. Koonin.