An in vivo screen identifies compounds that disrupt heterochromatin integrity

Heterochromatin plays a key role in gene repression, maintaining genome integrity and chromosome segregation. Fission yeast, Schizosaccharomyces pombe, utilizes conserved components to direct heterochromatin formation using siRNA generated by RNA interference (RNAi) to guide a histone H3 lysine 9 methyltransferase to cognate chromatin. To identify compounds that inhibit heterochromatin formation, an in vivo phenotypic screen for loss of silencing was performed. A tester strain harbouring a silent dominant selectable kanMX reporter gene within fission yeast centromeric heterochromatin was used to screen a diverse library of chemicals. HMS-I1 and HMS-I2 were identified as compounds that reproducibly increased G418 resistance due to loss of kanMX silencing, and decreased the level of repressive H3K9 methylation on centromeric repeats. The pattern of changes induced by HMS-I1 and HMS-I2 were consistent with inhibition of the histone deacetylases (HDACs) Clr3 and/or Sir2. Chemical-genetic interactions and expression profiling indicated that both HMS-I1 and HMS-I2 affect the activity of the Clr3-containing Snf2/HDAC repressor complex (SHREC). Exposure to HMS-I1 was also found to alleviate silencing of reporter genes in an Arabidopsis transgenic plant line and a mouse cell line. HMS-I2 also disrupted reporter gene silencing in Arabidopsis. In vitro assays indicate that HMS-I1 impairs the activity of human HDAC6 and HDAC10. As HMS-I1 and HMS-I2 bear no resemblance to known inhibitors of chromatin-based activities they represent potentially novel and valuable reagents for experimental and therapeutic purposes. Our findings highlight the use of in vivo chemical screening conducted in fission yeast to identify compounds that disrupt heterochromatin across plant, fungi and animal kingdoms. 16 RNA samples: 2 replicates of WT untreated (vehicle DMSO) (KE1-A, KE2-A), HMS-I1 treated (KE1-B, KE2-B), HMS-I2 treated (KE1-C, KE2-C), and 2 additional replicates of WT (KE05_wt_1, KE10_wt_2), 4 replicates of clr2∆ (KE01_2118_1, KE06_2118_2, KE03_0080_1, KE08_0080_2) and mit1∆ (KE02_1295_1, KE07_1295_2, KE04_1278_1, KE09_1278_2).