Let's say I have a gene I want to suppress. I methylate its promoter, not the gene itself, right?

Question

blues · Answer

Yes, methylating it's promoter would do it. It's enhancer too, if it's a eukaryote.

anonymous · Answer

Where again does a promoter bind? The chromatin? How about an enhancer?

blues · Answer

The promoter and the enhancer are so called "cis regulatory" elements. When they're not methylated (i.e., able to drive transcription), they do so by binding to transcription factors. The bound transcription factors then recruit other transcription factors and elements of the so called "transcription machinery."

If the cis regulatory elements are methylated they cannot serve as a scaffold for the DNA transcription complex, so transcription can't happen.

anonymous · Answer

Ah, right, you explained this to me when I asked about histone acetylation. Sorry for making you repeat!

Thanks!

blues · Answer

Not a problem. I don't recall posting on histone acetylation either, actually. Stay cool.

anonymous · Answer

http://openstudy.com/users/badreferences#/updates/4f34551de4b0fc0c1a0be9a2 Haha.

anonymous · Answer

One thing I would like to add is that the DNA of the promoter is methylated in a repressed gene. Methylation of histones is complex - some methylated histone residues are correlated with active genes while other histone  methylation events are associated with inactive genes.