Determination of histone acetylation status by chromatin immunoprecipitation.

Histone acetylation is the most studied posttranslation modification of nucleosomes. Understanding the mechanisms involved in global and promoter-specific histone acetylation will shed light on the control of transcriptional regulation. Chromatin immunoprecipitation is a powerful technique to study protein-DNA interactions in vivo. Proteins and DNA are cross-linked with formaldehyde, cells are lysed, and DNA is sheared by sonication. Protein-DNA complexes are immunoprecipitated with antibodies specific for total and acetylated histones and the relative occupancy of acetylated and total histones at selected loci is assessed by real-time PCR of the purified DNA.