MILLÁN ZAMBRANO , Gonzalo

Prefoldin is a cochaperone, present in all eukaryotes, that cooperates with the chaperonin CCT. It is known mainly for its functional relevance in the cytoplasmic folding of actin and tubulin monomers during cytoskeleton assembly. However, both canonical and prefoldin-like subunits of this heterohexameric complex have also been found in the...

The establishment of a stable reservoir of latently infected cells allows HIV to persist in the host. Usually, HIV infection of T cells results in integration of the viral genome, with a preference for regions in the human genome containing active genes, viral expression, and production of new viruses. However, in rare cases T cells become...

Chromatin remodeling is essential for proper adaptation to extracellular stimuli. The p38-related Hog1 SAPK is an important regulator of transcription that mediates chromatin remodeling upon stress. Hog1 targets the RSC chromatin remodeling complex to stress-responsive genes and rsc deficient cells display reduced induction of gene expression....

The 5′ to 3′ exoribonuclease Xrn1 is a large protein involved in cytoplasmatic mRNA degradation as a critical component of the major decaysome. Its deletion in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae is not lethal, but it has multiple physiological effects. In a previous study, our group showed that deletion of all tested components of the yeast...

Accumulation of topological stress in the form of DNA supercoiling is inherent to the advance of RNA polymerase II (Pol II) and needs to be resolved by DNA topoisomerases to sustain productive transcriptional elongation. Topoisomerases are therefore considered positive facilitators of transcription. Here, we show that, in contrast to this...

TFIIS stimulates RNA cleavage by RNA polymerase II and promotes the resolution of backtracking events. TFIIS acts in the chromatin context, but its contribution to the chromatin landscape has not yet been investigated. Co-transcriptional chromatin alterations include subtle changes in nucleosome positioning, like those expected to be elicited...

Transcriptional elongation requires the concerted action of several factors that allow RNA polymerase II to advance through chromatin in a highly processive manner. In order to identify novel elongation factors, we performed systematic yeast genetic screening based on the GLAM (Gene Length-dependent Accumulation of mRNA) assay, which is used to...

RNA polymerase II backtracking is a well-known phenomenon, but its involvement in gene regulation is yet to be addressed. Structural studies into the backtracked complex, new reactivation mechanisms and genome-wide approaches are shedding some light on this interesting aspect of gene transcription. In this review, we briefly summarise these new...

Ribosome assembly requires the concerted expression of hundreds of genes, which are transcribed by all three nuclear RNA polymerases. Transcription elongation involves dynamic interactions between RNA polymerases and chromatin. We performed a synthetic lethal screening in Saccharomyces cerevisiae with a conditional allele of SPT6, which encodes...