Aymoz, DelphineSolé, CarmePierre, Jean-JerroldSchmitt, MartaNadal Clanchet, Eulàlia dePosas Garriga, FrancescPelet, Serge2018-12-202018-12-202018Aymoz D, Solé C, Pierre JJ, Schmitt M, de Nadal E, Posas F, Pelet S. Timing of gene expression in a cell-fate decision system. Mol Syst Biol. 2018;14(4):e8024. DOI: 10.15252/msb.201780241744-4292http://hdl.handle.net/10230/36165During development, morphogens provide extracellular cues allowing cells to select a specific fate by inducing complex transcriptional programs. The mating pathway in budding yeast offers simplified settings to understand this process. Pheromone secreted by the mating partner triggers the activity of a MAPK pathway, which results in the expression of hundreds of genes. Using a dynamic expression reporter, we quantified the kinetics of gene expression in single cells upon exogenous pheromone stimulation and in the physiological context of mating. In both conditions, we observed striking differences in the timing of induction of mating-responsive promoters. Biochemical analyses and generation of synthetic promoter variants demonstrated how the interplay between transcription factor binding and nucleosomes contributes to determine the kinetics of transcription in a simplified cell-fate decision system.application/pdfeng© 2018 The Authors. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Timing of gene expression in a cell-fate decision systeminfo:eu-repo/semantics/articlehttp://dx.doi.org/10.15252/msb.20178024Gene expressionMAPK pathwaySingle‐cell measurementsYeast matinginfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess