Distribution of H3K27me3, H3K9me3, and H3K4me3 along autophagy-related genes highly expressed in starved zebrafish myotubes

Abstract

The zebrafish (<i>Danio rerio</i>) remains the teleost fish of choice for biological investigations due to the vast array of molecular tools and resources available. To better understand the epigenetic regulation of autophagy, we utilized a primary myotube culture system generated from isolated myogenic precursor cells (MPCs) from zebrafish grown under starvation conditions using a media devoid of serum and amino acids. Here, we report starvation-induced regulation of several autophagy-related genes (<i>atg</i>) expression and profile the distribution of H3K27me3, H3K9me3, and H3K4me3 marks along <i>lc3b</i>, <i>atg4b</i> and <i>p62/sqstm1</i> loci. These data support epigenetic regulation of autophagy in response to starvation that suggests a level of regulation that can be sustained for chronic conditions via chromatin modification.