Toward an Ensemble View of Chromatosome Structure: A Paradigm Shift from One to Many

Abstract

There is renewed interest in linker histone (LH)-nucleosome binding and how LHs influence eukaryotic DNA compaction. For a long time, the goal was to uncover "the structure of the chromatosome," but recent studies of LH-nucleosome complexes have revealed an ensemble of structures. Notably, the reconstituted LH-nucleosome complexes used in experiments rarely correspond to the sequence combinations present in organisms. For a full understanding of the determinants of the distribution of the chromatosome structural ensemble, studies must include a complete description of the sequences and experimental conditions used, and be designed to enable systematic evaluation of sequence and environmental effects.

Keywords: NMR; X-ray crystallography; chromatin; chromatosome; cryo-EM; linker histone; macromolecular dynamics; macromolecular structure; nucleosome.