Project Goals
Eukaryotic genomes are packaged into nucleosomes, which are widely belived to generally repress gene expression (1-4). Repression is particularly evident at yeast telomeres, where genes within the telomeric heterochromatin are silenced (5,6), an effect that depends on the functions of the silencing proteins Sir2p, Sir3p, Sir4p, and Rap1 (7-12). To determine whether these concepts, developed through the analysis of a limited number of genes, apply to the entire yeast genome, we have used high-density arrays to study the effects of depleting nucleosomal histones and silencing factors on genome-wide expression.