Solution structure of human MBD1 CXXC1

• DOI: 10.1007/s10858-015-9986-8
• Publication Date: 2015-09-09T21:44:59Z
• Authors: Ross Thomson; Brian O. Smith
• Keywords: CpG site

Methylation of a CpG dinucleotide at cytosine C5 (mCpG)is major modification in vertebrate genomes associatedwith epigenetic gene silencing. methylation recruitsproteins which specifically recognise this motif and thesemethylated DNA binding proteins then recruit enzymeswhich chemically physically alter chromatin, inducingtranscriptional repression. Although most motifs aremethylated, short (500–2000 bp) CG-rich regions, knownas islands (CGIs), found within *60 % humangene promoters remain non-methylated (Bird 2002). Howthese CGIs contribute to epigentic regulation is an area ofcontinuing research.To investigate the possibility that are targetedto these CGIs, Voo et al. (2000) used ligand screen toidentify bind CpGs. Theyidentified protein, CFP1 (formerly CGBP) contains acysteine rich zinc finger–CXXC (ZF-CXXC) domain.Since discovery, several more CXXC containing pro-teins have been identified as reviewed recently by Longet (2013). domains can be differentiated intothree groups, type 1 contain theKFGG motif, 2 do not lack 3 extended loop oftypes but (Fig. 3a). The conservedCXXCXXCX