Link to Pubmed [PMID] – 39913590
Link to HAL – hal-04937691
Link to DOI – 10.1126/science.adm9466
Science, 2025, 387 (6734), pp.eadm9466. ⟨10.1126/science.adm9466⟩
In eukaryotes, DNA-associated protein complexes coevolve with genomic sequences to orchestrate chromatin folding. We investigate the relationship between DNA sequence and the spontaneous loading and activity of chromatin components in the absence of coevolution. Using bacterial genomes integrated into Saccharomyces cerevisiae , which diverged from yeast more than 2 billion years ago, we show that nucleosomes, cohesins, and associated transcriptional machinery can lead to the formation of two different chromatin archetypes, one transcribed and the other silent, independently of heterochromatin formation. These two archetypes also form on eukaryotic exogenous sequences, depend on sequence composition, and can be predicted using neural networks trained on the native genome. They do not mix in the nucleus, leading to a bipartite nuclear compartmentalization, reminiscent of the organization of vertebrate nuclei.