RNA Splicing Factors and RNA-Directed DNA Methylation.
RNA-directed histone and/or DNA modification is a conserved mechanism for the establishment of epigenetic marks from yeasts and plants to mammals. The heterochromation formation in yeast is mediated by RNAi-directed silencing mechanism, while the establishment of DNA methylation in plants is through the RNA-directed DNA methylation (RdDM) pathway. Recently, splicing factors are reported to be involved in both RNAi-directed heterochromatin formation in yeast and the RdDM pathway in plants. In yeast, splicing factors may provide a platform for facilitating the siRNA generation through an interaction with RDRC and thereby affect the heterochromatin formation, whereas in plants, various splicing factors seem to act at different steps in the RdDM pathway.
State Key Laboratory of Crop Genetics and Germplasm Enhancement, College of Resources and Environmental Sciences, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing 210095, China. chaofeng.huang@njau.edu.cn.
Chao-Feng
CF
Huang
Shanghai Center for Plant Stress Biology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200032, China. jkzhu@purdue.edu.
Jian-Kang
JK
Zhu