ChIP-Seq: A Powerful Tool for Studying Protein-DNA Interactions in Plants

DNA-binding proteins, including transcription factors, epigenetic and chromatin modifiers, control gene expressions in plants. To pinpoint the binding sits of DNA-binding proteins in genome is crucial for decoding gene regulatory networks. Chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) followed by high-throughput DNA sequencing (ChIP-Seq) is a widely used approach to identify the DNA regions bound by a specific protein in vivo. The information generated from ChIP-Seq has tremendously advanced our understanding on the mechanism of transcription factors, cofactors and histone modifications in regulating gene expression. In this review, we reviewed the recent research advance of ChIP-Seq in plants, including description of the ChIP-Seq workflow and its various applications in plants, and in addition, provided perspective of the potential advances of ChIP-Seq.