Our interest are epigenetic pathways that help plants to acquire a transcriptional memory regulating gene expression based on past experience. Such gene memories are established by chromatin compaction through Polycomb Group complexes leading to tight gene repression. We are interested in mechanisms that recruit and stabilize epigenetic repression but also how distal enhancers at repressed genes can overcome epigenetic gene repression.

1. Zicola, J., Liu, L., Tänzler, P., Turck, F. Targeted DNA methylation represses two enhancers of FLOWERING LOCUS T in Arabidopsis thaliana. Nature Plants 5: 300–307 (2019)
2. Zhou, Y., Wang, Y., Krause, K., Yang, T., Dongus, J. A., Zhang, Y., Turck, F. Telobox motifs recruit CLF/SWN–PRC2 for H3K27me3 deposition via TRB factors in Arabidopsis. Nature Genetics 50:638-644 (2018).
3. Zhou Y, Romero-Campero FJ, Gómez-Zambrano Á, Turck^#,F, Calonje^# M. H2A monoubiquitination in Arabidopsis thaliana is generally independent of LHP1 and PRC2 activity. Genome Biol. 18:69 (2017). ^#shared correspondence
4. Zhou Y, Tergemina E, Cui H, Förderer A, Hartwig B, Velikkakam James G, Schneeberger K, Turck F. Ctf4-related protein recruits LHP1-PRC2 to maintain H3K27me3 levels in dividing cells in Arabidopsis thaliana. PNAS, 114: 4833-4838 (2017).
5. Liang, S.C., Hartwig, B., Perera, P., Mora-García, S., de Leau, E., Thornton, H., de Alves, F.L., Rapsilber, J., Yang, S., Velikkakam James, G., Schneeberger, K., Finnegan, E.J., Turck^#, F. and J. Goodrich^#. Kicking against the PRCs - A Domesticated Transposase Antagonises Silencing Mediated by Polycomb Group Proteins and Is an Accessory Component of Polycomb Repressive Complex 2. PLoS Genetics 11:e1005660. (2015). ^#shared correspondence