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Updated: Aug 15, 2025

Author Spotlight: An Integrated Workflow to Study the Promoter-Centric Spatio-Temporal Genome Architecture in Scarce Cell Populations
Published on: April 21, 2023
The chromatin signatures of enhancers and their dynamic regulation
Amandine Barral1, Jérôme Déjardin2
1Institute for Regenerative Medicine, Epigenetics Institute, Department of Cell and Developmental Biology, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA.
Abstract:
Enhancers are cis-regulatory elements that can stimulate gene expression from distance, and drive precise spatiotemporal gene expression profiles during development. Functional enhancers display specific features including an open chromatin conformation, Histone H3 lysine 27 acetylation, Histone H3 lysine 4 mono-methylation enrichment, and enhancer RNAs production. These features are modified upon developmental cues which impacts their activity. In this review, we describe the current state of knowledge about enhancer functions and the diverse chromatin signatures found on enhancers. We also discuss the dynamic changes of enhancer chromatin signatures, and their impact on lineage specific gene expression profiles, during development or cellular differentiation.
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