A mysterious structure occupies up to 47% of every chromosome, study finds

[natasa778]

"Defining the structure of all 46 human chromosomes for the first time has forced us to reconsider the idea that they are composed almost exclusively of chromatin - an assumption that has gone largely unchallenged for almost 100 years," says one of the team, biologist Daniel Booth.

In their analysis, Booth and his team found that chromatin only accounted for between 53 and 70 percent of the total contents of chromosomes.

A structure called the chromosome periphery - something that researchers have caught glimpses of in the past, but had no way of knowing how extensive it was - accounted for the remaining 30 to 47 percent of the 46 chromosomes.

That means for any given chromosome, DNA and its supporting proteins might only account for half of the total contents.

http://www.sciencealert.com/scienti...re-that-occupies-half-of-all-your-chromosomes

 

[trishrhymes]

Thanks for sharing this. Fascinating science. Probably of no direct relevance to ME at this stage, but I love reading about developments in Cell biology.

 

[lansbergen]

The phases

Drawing http://www.nature.com/nrm/journal/v11/n2/fig_tab/nrm2832_F1.html

Picture https://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/cells/fluorescencemitosis/


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nucleolus