The Centromere Paradox: Stable Inheritance with Rapidly Evolving DNA

By Steven Henikoff, K. Ahmad, Harmit S. Malik. Science, 2001

1,289 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Every eukaryotic chromosome has a centromere, the locus responsible for poleward movement at mitosis and meiosis. Although conventional loci are specified by their DNA sequences, current evidence favors a chromatin-based inheritance mechanism for centromeres. The chromosome segregation machinery is highly conserved across all eukaryotes, but the DNA and protein components specific to centromeric chromatin are evolving rapidly. Incompatibilities between rapidly evolving centromeric components may be responsible for both the organization of centromeric regions and the reproductive isolation of emerging species.

Subfields: Cell Biology, Molecular Biology, Plant Science

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/1c0617669f1f62f84dd85edc3fcb9666031d3ca9

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Cell Biology

1. Steven Henikoff

In Molecular Biology

1. G. Almouzni
2. Steven Henikoff
3. Roderick J. O’Sullivan
4. Elaine M. Dunleavy
5. Harmit S. Malik
6. T. Jenuwein
7. Aline V. Probst
8. Ulrich Braunschweig

In Plant Science

1. Steven Henikoff
2. T. Jenuwein
3. Paul B. Talbert

Citations in the corpus

• Epigenetic inheritance during the cell cycle (2009, background): “It presents a paradigm for an epigenetically defined locus, because its functionality is not ensured by the underlying DNA sequence but rather by its particular chromatin organizatio”
• The profile of repeat‐associated histone lysine methylation states in the mouse epigenome (2005, background): “Although there is variability and different evolutionary drive for satellites in higher eukaryotes (Henikoff et al, 2001), they represent crucial sequence elements for the definition of centromeres or neo-centromeres (Amor and Choo, 2002; Rudd et al, 2003).”
• Phylogenomics of the nucleosome (2003, background): “In addition, CenH3s are only ∼50% identical to H3s in the HF”