School of Biomedical Sciences cordially invites you to join the following seminar:

Speaker: Professor Guohong Li, College of Life Sciences, Wuhan University, Laboratory of Chromatin and Epigenetic Regulation, Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Talk Title: Structural basis of genome folding and its functions in gene regulation and human diseases

Date: 18 December 2024 (Wednesday)
Time: 2:00 pm – 3:00 pm
Venue: Seminar Room 4, G/F, Laboratory Block, 21 Sassoon Road
Host: Professor Yang Liu

Biography

Prof. Guohong Li is currently a professor of College of Life Sciences at Wuhan University (Hubei, China). Prof. Li received his undergraduate degree from Wuhan University and his Master of Science from Peking University Health Center in 1998 and his Doctor of Philosophy (Dr. Rer. Nat.) degree from Heidelberg University in 2003. Prof. Li carried out his postdoctoral training with Dr. Danny Reinberg at UMDNJ and NYU from 2003 to 2009. Prof. Li joined the Institute of Biophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2010 as a CAS Hundred Talents Investigator. Prof. Li’s group has been mainly focusing on studying the structure and biological functions of the 30-nm chromatin fiber in epigenetic regulation of gene expression, as well as the underlying molecular mechanisms. In the past years, Prof. Li’s group has made significant progresses on the structure and function of 30-nm chromatin fiber, the structure and function of centromeric chromatin, and epigenetic regulation of chromatin dynamics during cell fate determination. Prof. Li serves on editorial boards of Genome Biol., BAA-gene regulatory, and JBC, and receives a number of awards and honors, including Tan Jiazhen Awards for Life Sciences, HHMI International Research Scholar, New Cornerstone Researcher, National Natural Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholar etc.

Abstract

Previously, we reported the 11 Å resolution cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) structures of 30 nm chromatin fibers reconstituted in the presence of linker histone H1, which reveals a left-handed double helix twisted by the repeating tetra-nucleosomal structural units. Recently, we have determined the 3.6 Å resolution cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) structures of 30 nm chromatin fibers with linker histone H5 and MeCP2, uncovering that asymmetries and polarities of nucleosomes play important roles in the folding of chromatin fibers. In addition, we also demonstrated that formation of 30-nm chromatin fibers greatly facilitates the faithful propagation of H2AK119ub1 and H3K27me3 during cell divisions. In summary, our study demonstrates that the tetranucleosome is a novel regulatory structural unit of chromatin fibers beyond the nucleosome, and provides crucial mechanistic insights into functions of chromatin fibers in transcriptional regulation and epigenetic inheritance.

ALL ARE WELCOME.