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Isolation of Labile Multi-protein Complexes by in vivo Controlled Cellular Cross-Linking and Immuno-magnetic Affinity Chromatography
Published on: March 9, 2010
Structures of the human Mediator and Mediator-bound preinitiation complex
Xizi Chen1, Xiaotong Yin1, Jiabei Li1
1Fudan University Shanghai Cancer Center, Institutes of Biomedical Sciences, State Key Laboratory of Genetic Engineering, Shanghai Key Laboratory of Radiation Oncology, and Shanghai Key Laboratory of Medical Epigenetics, Shanghai Medical College of Fudan University, Shanghai 200032, China.
Abstract:
The 1.3-megadalton transcription factor IID (TFIID) is required for preinitiation complex (PIC) assembly and RNA polymerase II (Pol II)-mediated transcription initiation on almost all genes. The 26-subunit Mediator stimulates transcription and cyclin-dependent kinase 7 (CDK7)-mediated phosphorylation of the Pol II C-terminal domain (CTD). We determined the structures of human Mediator in the Tail module-extended (at near-atomic resolution) and Tail-bent conformations and structures of TFIID-based PIC-Mediator (76 polypeptides, ~4.1 megadaltons) in four distinct conformations. PIC-Mediator assembly induces concerted reorganization (Head-tilting and Middle-down) of Mediator and creates a Head-Middle sandwich, which stabilizes two CTD segments and brings CTD to CDK7 for phosphorylation; this suggests a CTD-gating mechanism favorable for phosphorylation. The TFIID-based PIC architecture modulates Mediator organization and TFIIH stabilization, underscoring the importance of TFIID in orchestrating PIC-Mediator assembly.
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