Study reveals new role for RNA interference during chromosomal replication
Sunday, October 16, 2011 - 12:01
in Biology & Nature
At the same time that a cell's DNA gets duplicated, a third of it gets super-compacted into repetitive clumps called heterochromatin. This dense packing serves to repress or "silence" the DNA sequences within -- which could wreck the genome if activated -- as well as regulate the activity of nearby genes. When the cell divides, the daughter cells not only inherit a copy of the mother cell's DNA, but also the exact pattern in which that DNA is clumped into heterochromatin.