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Nucleosome positioning signals in genomic DNA.
Although histones can form nucleosomes on virtually any genomic sequence, DNA sequences show considerable variability in their binding affinity. We have used DNA sequences of Saccharomyces cerevisiae whose nucleosome binding affinities have been experimentally determined (Yuan et al. 2005) to train a support vector machine to identify the nucleosome formation potential of any given sequence of DNA. The DNA sequences whose nucleosome formation potential are most accurately predicted are those that contain strong nucleosome forming or inhibiting signals and are found within nucleosome length stretches of genomic DNA with continuous nucleosome formation or inhibition signals. We have accurately predicted the experimentally determined nucleosome positions across a well-characterized promoter region of S. cerevisiae and identified strong periodicity within 199 center-aligned mononucleosomes studied recently (Segal et al. 2006) despite there being no periodicity information used to train the support vector machine. Our analysis suggests that only a subset of nucleosomes are likely to be positioned by intrinsic sequence signals. This observation is consistent with the available experimental data and is inconsistent with the proposal of a nucleosome positioning code. Finally, we show that intrinsic nucleosome positioning signals are both more inhibitory and more variable in promoter regions than in open reading frames in S. cerevisiae. (Peckham HE, Thurman RE, Fu Y, Stamatoyannopoulos JA, Noble WS, Struhl K, Weng Z. PUBMED)

Replication in context: dynamic regulation of DNA replication patterns in metazoans.
Replication in eukaryotes initiates from discrete genomic regions according to a strict, often tissue-specific temporal programme. However, the locations of initiation events within initiation regions vary, show sequence disparity and are affected by interactions with distal elements. Increasing evidence suggests that specification of replication sites and the timing of replication are dynamic processes that are regulated by tissue-specific and developmental cues, and are responsive to epigenetic modifications. Dynamic specification of replication patterns might serve to prevent or resolve possible spatial and/or temporal conflicts between replication, transcription and chromatin assembly, and facilitate subtle or extensive changes of gene expression during differentiation and development. (FROM PUBMED Aladjem MI.)