5-methylcytosine (5mC) and 5-hydroxymethylcytosine (5hmC) increase CREB1 binding to the C/EBP half-site GCAA. Mus musculus

In human and mouse stem cells and brain, 5-methylcytosine (5mC) and 5-hydroxymethylcytosine (5hmC) can occur outside of CG dinucleotides. Using protein binding microarrays (PBMs) containing 60-mer DNA probes, we evaluated the effect of 5mC and 5hmC on one DNA strand on the double-stranded DNA binding of the mouse B-ZIP transcription factors (TFs) CREB1, ATF1, and JUND. 5mC inhibited CREB1 binding to the canonical CRE half-site |GTCA, but increased binding to the C/EBP half-site |GCAA. 5hmC inhibited CREB1 binding to all 8-mers except TGAT|GCAA, where binding is enhanced. We observed similar DNA binding patterns with the closely related TF: ATF1. In contrast, both 5mC and 5hmC inhibited binding of JUND. These results identify new DNA sequences that are well-bound by CREB1 and ATF1 only when they contain 5mC or 5hmC. Analysis of two x-ray structures examines the consequences of 5mC and 5hmC on DNA binding by CREB and FOS|JUN. Overall design: Protein binding microarray (PBM) experiments were performed for a set of 3 mouse B-ZIP transcription factors, CREB1, ATF1, and JUND. Briefly, the PBMs involved binding GST-tagged DNA-binding proteins to double-stranded 44K Agilent microarrays (Berger et al., Nature Biotechnology 2006) in order to determine their binding preferences to sequences containing modified cytosines. We modified the double stranding step of the PBM protocol in which the nucleotide mixture contained 5-methylcytosine or 5-hydroxymethylcytosine. Details of the modified cytosine PBM protocol are described in Khund-Sayeed S et al., Integrative Biology, 2016.