Histone marks and chromatin remodelers on the regulation of neurogenin1 gene in RA induced neuronal differentiation of P19 cells

Neurogenin1 is an important bHLH protein that plays crucial role in neurogenesis. We first show that the expression of ngn1 increases drastically in RA induced neuronal differentiation. During which, a three successive stages of the epigenetic changes surrounding the ngn1 gene are found correlated with a repression to activation of the gene in P19 cells. Recruiting of a repressive histone code H3K27me3 on the ngn1 gene is the dominant change in first repression stage, which is followed by the binding of the active codes of H3K9ac, H3K14ac, and the H3K4me3 in the second and third stages of RA treatment. Additionally, BRM but not BRG1 is specifically recruited to ngn1 gene at the third stage and is positively involved in the RA induced ngn1 expression. We propose that histone modifiers and chromatin remodelers are pivotal in the activation of the ngn1 gene in RA induced differentiation of P19 cells.