title: Epigenetic arbitration of cell fate decisions: tipping the bias.
abstract: Epigenetic modifications of nucleosomal histones are thought to mediate transcriptional states and impose heritable instructions upon differentiation. In a paper of Torres-Padilla and colleagues in Nature, protein modification at arginine residues, namely of core histones, is correlated with cell fate determination at the 4-cell stage in the mouse embryo. This represents the first link of global epigenetic instructions associated with specification of early cell lineages.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Developmental Genetics and Imprinting, The Babraham Institute, Babraham Research Campus, Cambridge CB22 3AT, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Myriam
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hemberger
authors.forename: Wendy
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Dean
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001120:Arginine / Q000378:metabolism; D019070:Cell Lineage / Q000235:genetics*; D019175:DNA Methylation; D004622:Embryo, Mammalian / Q000166:cytology / Q000201:enzymology; D044127:Epigenesis, Genetic; D006657:Histones / Q000378:metabolism; D051379:Mice; D011484:Protein-Arginine N-Methyltransferases / Q000378:metabolism
chemical_list: D006657:Histones; D001120:Arginine; D011484:Protein-Arginine N-Methyltransferases; C119966:coactivator-associated arginine methyltransferase 1