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An atlas of chromatin accessibility in the adult human brain.

Genome research | 2018

Most common genetic risk variants associated with neuropsychiatric disease are noncoding and are thought to exert their effects by disrupting the function of cis regulatory elements (CREs), including promoters and enhancers. Within each cell, chromatin is arranged in specific patterns to expose the repertoire of CREs required for optimal spatiotemporal regulation of gene expression. To further understand the complex mechanisms that modulate transcription in the brain, we used frozen postmortem samples to generate the largest human brain and cell-type-specific open chromatin data set to date. Using the Assay for Transposase Accessible Chromatin followed by sequencing (ATAC-seq), we created maps of chromatin accessibility in two cell types (neurons and non-neurons) across 14 distinct brain regions of five individuals. Chromatin structure varies markedly by cell type, with neuronal chromatin displaying higher regional variability than that of non-neurons. Among our findings is an open chromatin region (OCR) specific to neurons of the striatum. When placed in the mouse, a human sequence derived from this OCR recapitulates the cell type and regional expression pattern predicted by our ATAC-seq experiments. Furthermore, differentially accessible chromatin overlaps with the genetic architecture of neuropsychiatric traits and identifies differences in molecular pathways and biological functions. By leveraging transcription factor binding analysis, we identify protein-coding and long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) with cell-type and brain region specificity. Our data provide a valuable resource to the research community and we provide this human brain chromatin accessibility atlas as an online database "Brain Open Chromatin Atlas (BOCA)" to facilitate interpretation.

Pubmed ID: 29945882 RIS Download

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Associated grants

  • Agency: NIA NIH HHS, United States
    Id: N01AG12100
  • Agency: NIA NIH HHS, United States
    Id: R01 AG050986
  • Agency: NIA NIH HHS, United States
    Id: U01 AG016976
  • Agency: NIMH NIH HHS, United States
    Id: R01 MH109677
  • Agency: NHLBI NIH HHS, United States
    Id: R01 HL105756
  • Agency: NIDA NIH HHS, United States
    Id: R01 DA015446
  • Agency: NIA NIH HHS, United States
    Id: R01 AG033193
  • Agency: BLRD VA, United States
    Id: I01 BX002395
  • Agency: NINDS NIH HHS, United States
    Id: R01 NS100529
  • Agency: Wellcome Trust, United Kingdom

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Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO) (tool)

RRID:SCR_005012

Functional genomics data repository supporting MIAME-compliant data submissions. Includes microarray-based experiments measuring the abundance of mRNA, genomic DNA, and protein molecules, as well as non-array-based technologies such as serial analysis of gene expression (SAGE) and mass spectrometry proteomic technology. Array- and sequence-based data are accepted. Collection of curated gene expression DataSets, as well as original Series and Platform records. The database can be searched using keywords, organism, DataSet type and authors. DataSet records contain additional resources including cluster tools and differential expression queries.

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featureCounts (tool)

RRID:SCR_012919

A read summarization program, which counts mapped reads for the genomic features such as genes and exons.

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