Variable Glutamine-Rich Repeats Modulate Transcription Factor Activity

• DOI: 10.1016/j.molcel.2015.07.003
• Publication Date: 2015-08-06T20:57:57Z
• Authors: Rita Gemayel; Sreenivas Chavali; Ksenia Pougach; Matthieu Legendre; Bo Zhu; Steven Boeynaems; Elisa van der Zande; Kris Gevaert; Frederic Rousseau; Joost Schymkowitz; M. Madan Babu; Kevin J. Verstrepen
• Keywords: Repetitive Sequences, Amino Acid; 0301 basic medicine; Saccharomyces cerevisiae Proteins; TANDEM REPEATS; Glutamine; Molecular Sequence Data; Saccharomyces cerevisiae; Article; SACCHAROMYCES-CEREVISIAE; 03 medical and health sciences; POLYQ PROTEINS; Gene Expression Regulation, Fungal; POLYGLUTAMINE EXPANSION; YEAST; Protein Interaction Domains and Motifs; PROMOTER NUCLEOSOMES; DNA, Fungal; Molecular Biology; GENE-EXPRESSION; Base Sequence; Protein Stability; BIOFILM FORMATION; Biology and Life Sciences; Cell Biology; CYC8-TUP1 COREPRESSOR; Repressor Proteins; Solubility; PROTEIN HOMEOSTASIS

Excessive expansions of glutamine (Q)-rich repeats in various human proteins are known to result in severe neurodegenerative disorders such as Huntington's disease and several ataxias. However, the physiological role of these repeats and the consequences of more moderate repeat variation remain unknown. Here, we demonstrate that Q-rich domains are highly enriched in eukaryotic transcription factors where they act as functional modulators. Incremental changes in the number of repeats in the yeast transcriptional regulator Ssn6 (Cyc8) result in systematic, repeat-length-dependent variation in expression of target genes that result in direct phenotypic changes. The function of Ssn6 increases with its repeat number until a certain threshold where further expansion leads to aggregation. Quantitative proteomic analysis reveals that the Ssn6 repeats affect its solubility and interactions with Tup1 and other regulators. Thus, Q-rich repeats are dynamic functional domains that modulate a regulator's innate function, with the inherent risk of pathogenic repeat expansions.