Structure of the CENP-A nucleosome and its implications for centromeric chromatin architecture

Centromeres are dictated by the epigenetic inheritance of the centromeric nucleosome containing the centromere-specific histone H3 variant, CENP-A. The structure of the CENP-A nucleosome has been considered to be the fundamental architecture of the centromeric chromatin. Controversy exists in the literature regarding the CENP-A nucleosome structures, with octasome, hemisome, compact octasome, hexasome, and tetrasome models being reported. Some of these CENP-A nucleosome models may correspond to transient intermediates for the assembly of the mature CENP-A nucleosome; however, their significances are still unclear. Therefore, the structure of the mature CENP-A nucleosome has been eagerly awaited. We reconstituted the human CENP-A nucleosome with its cognate centromeric DNA fragment, and determined its crystal structure. In this review, we describe the structure and the physical properties of the CENP-A nucleosome, and discuss their implications for centromeric chromatin architecture.