H3K27me3 levels with and without DVR06. Arabidopsis thaliana

Monocarpic plants flower only once and then produce seeds. Many monocarpic plants require a cold treatment known as vernalization before they flower. This requirement delays flowering until the plant senses warm temperatures in the spring. Exposure to high temperatures following vernalization causes devernalization, which cancels the vernalized state, inhibiting flowering and promoting vegetative growth. In this study, we screened over 16,000 chemical compounds and identified five small molecules (devernalizers; DVRs) that induce devernalization in Arabidopsis thaliana at room temperature without requiring a high-temperature treatment. Treatment with DVRs reactivated the expression of FLOWERING LOCUS C (FLC), a master repressor of flowering, by reducing the deposition of repressive histone modifications, thereby delaying flowering time. Three of the DVRs identified shared two structures: a hydantoin-like region and a spiro-like carbon. Treatment with DVR06, which has a simple chemical structure containing these domains, delayed flowering time and reduced the deposition of repressive histone modifications at FLC. To examine H3K27me3 levels, we conducted ChIP-seq using plants treated with DVR06.

一次结实植物仅开花一次，随后结出种子。多数一次结实植物在开花前需要经过一种名为春化作用（vernalization）的低温处理。该需求使得植物需等到感知春季回暖后，才能启动开花程序。春化处理后若暴露于高温环境，会引发脱春化作用（devernalization），抵消春化状态，抑制开花并促进营养生长。本研究筛选了超过16000种化学化合物，鉴定出5种可在室温下诱导拟南芥（Arabidopsis thaliana）发生脱春化作用的小分子化合物（脱春化剂；DVRs），无需额外高温处理。经脱春化剂处理后，开花关键抑制因子——开花位点C（FLOWERING LOCUS C，FLC）的表达会被重新激活，其机制为降低抑制性组蛋白修饰的沉积水平，进而延迟开花时间。其中3种脱春化剂共享两类结构特征：类乙内酰脲区域与类螺环碳原子。使用含有此类结构域的简单化学结构化合物DVR06进行处理，可延迟拟南芥开花时间，并降低FLC位点的抑制性组蛋白修饰沉积水平。为检测组蛋白H3第27位三甲基化（H3K27me3）水平，本研究对经DVR06处理的植株开展了染色质免疫共沉淀测序（ChIP-seq）实验。