Transgenerational inheritance of mitochondrial stress adaptation in C. elegans

Using Caenorhabditis elegans to investigate environmental cues-induced mitochondrial dysfunction, we found that exposure to electron transport chain (ETC) inhibitors at the parental generation initiates the transmission of heritable information to descendants and make descendants stress-adaptive. This mitochondrial stress adaptation phenotype can persist for at least three generations. Animals lacking histone H3K4me3 chromatin modifiers, or the methyltransferase of N6-methyldeoxyadenosine (6mA), lose the ability to initiate stress adaptation in progeny. H3K4me3 plays a role upstream of 6mA, while both mark promoter regions of mitochondrial unfolded protein response (UPR mt ) genes and activate the UPR mt pathway to alleviate mitochondrial damage. Overall design: Profile H3K4me3 occupancy in whole body from L3-L4 mix C. elegans, worms were treated with antimycin A (AA) or not treated (NT).