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Summary Understanding the diversity of human tissues is fundamental to disease and requires linking genetic information, which is identical in most of an individual’s cells, with epigenetic mechanisms that could play tissue-specific roles. Surveys of DNA methylation in human tissues have established a complex landscape including both tissue-specific and invariant methylation patterns1,2. Here we report high coverage methylomes that catalogue cytosine methylation in all contexts for the major human organ systems, integrated with matched transcriptomes and genomic sequence. By combining these diverse data types with each individuals’ phased genome3, we identified widespread tissue-specific differential CG methylation (mCG), partially methylated domains, allele-specific methylation and transcription, and the unexpected presence of non-CG methylation (mCH) in almost all human tissues. mCH correlated with tissue-specific functions, and using this mark, we made novel predictions of genes that escape X-chromosome inactivation in specific tissues. Overall, DNA methylation in multiple genomic contexts varies substantially among human tissues.

Natural epigenetic variation provides a source for the generation of phenotypic diversity, but to understand its contribution to such diversity, its interaction with genetic variation requires further investigation. Here we report population-wide DNA sequencing of genomes, transcriptomes and methylomes of wild Arabidopsis thaliana accessions. Single cytosine methylation polymorphisms are not linked to genotype. However, the rate of linkage disequilibrium decay amongst differentially methylated regions targeted by RNA-directed DNA methylation is similar to the rate for single nucleotide polymorphisms. Association analyses of these RNA-directed DNA methylation regions with genetic variants identified thousands of methylation quantitative trait loci, which revealed the population estimate of genetically dependent methylation variation. Analysis of invariably methylated transposons and genes across this population indicates that loci targeted by RNA-directed DNA methylation are epigenetically activated in pollen and seeds, which facilitates proper development of these structures.

Eukaryotes possess several RNA surveillance mechanisms that prevent undesirable aberrant RNAs from accumulating. Arabidopsis XRN2, XRN3, and XRN4 are three orthologs of the yeast 5′-to-3′ exoribonuclease, Rat1/Xrn2, that function in multiple RNA decay pathways. XRN activity is maintained by FIERY1 (FRY1), which converts the XRN inhibitor, adenosine 3′, 5′-bisphosphate (PAP), into 5′AMP. To identify the roles of XRNs and FRY1 in suppression of non-coding RNAs, strand-specific genome-wide tiling arrays and deep strand-specific RNA-Seq analyses were carried out in fry1 and xrn single and double mutants. In fry1-6, about 2000 new transcripts were identified that extended the 3′ end of specific mRNAs; many of these were also observed in genotypes that possess the xrn3-3 mutation, a partial loss-of-function allele. Mutations in XRN2 and XRN4 in combination with xrn3-3 revealed only a minor effect on 3′ extensions, indicating that these genes may be partially redundant with XRN3. We also observed the accumulation of 3′ remnants of many DCL1-processed microRNA (miRNA) precursors in fry1-6 and xrn3-3. These findings suggest that XRN3, in combination with FRY1, is required to prevent the accumulation of 3′ extensions that arise from thousands of mRNA and miRNA precursor transcripts.

Stop codons have been exploited for genetic incorporation of unnatural amino acids (Uaas) in live cells, but their low incorporation efficiency, which is possibly due to competition from release factors, limits the power and scope of this technology. Here we show that the reportedly essential release factor 1 (RF1) can be knocked out from Escherichia coli by 'fixing' release factor 2 (RF2). The resultant strain JX33 is stable and independent, and it allows UAG to be reassigned from a stop signal to an amino acid when a UAG-decoding tRNA-synthetase pair is introduced. Uaas were efficiently incorporated at multiple UAG sites in the same gene without translational termination in JX33. We also found that amino acid incorporation at endogenous UAG codons is dependent on RF1 and mRNA context, which explains why E. coli tolerates apparent global suppression of UAG. JX33 affords a unique autonomous host for synthesizing and evolving new protein functions by enabling Uaa incorporation at multiple sites.

Cytosine DNA methylation (mC) is a genome modification that can regulate the expression of coding and non-coding genetic elements. However, little is known about the involvement of mC in response to environmental cues. Using whole genome bisulfite sequencing to assess the spatio-temporal dynamics of mC in rice grown under phosphate starvation and recovery conditions, we identified widespread phosphate starvation-induced changes in mC, preferentially localized in transposable elements (TEs) close to highly induced genes. These changes in mC occurred after changes in nearby gene transcription, were mostly DCL3a-independent, and could partially be propagated through mitosis, however no evidence of meiotic transmission was observed. Similar analyses performed in Arabidopsis revealed a very limited effect of phosphate starvation on mC, suggesting a species-specific mechanism. Overall, this suggests that TEs in proximity to environmentally induced genes are silenced via hypermethylation, and establishes the temporal hierarchy of transcriptional and epigenomic changes in response to stress. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.09343.001, eLife digest Phosphate is an important nutrient for all living organisms. This chemical group forms part of the backbone of DNA molecules, and has a crucial role in many chemical reactions that occur inside cells. Plants in particular need a source of phosphate to grow. This is why agricultural fertilizers are rich in phosphate, but unfortunately, the use of fertilizers is not sustainable. Many researchers are now looking for new ways to maintain high crop yields without chemical fertilizers, and understanding how crops are affected in times of shortage will be pivotal to achieving this goal. DNA contains coded information in the form of genes, which can either be switched on or off. Chemical marks added to the DNA can earmark genes for activation or inactivation, a bit like handwritten annotations in an instruction manual. One example is the addition of a chemical tag called a methyl group to one of the letters of the DNA code—so-called ‘cytosine methylation’. However, little is known about how the pattern of these chemical marks on DNA changes in response to changes in the environment. Secco et al. investigated changes in cytosine methylation in both rice and Arabidopsis plants that had been deprived of phosphate. Arabidopsis, or thale cress, is a model plant that is often studied by plant biologists because it is small and grows quickly. The experiments showed that when rice plants were not given enough phosphate, the pattern of DNA methylation changed. This was particularly true around certain genes that help the plants survive in these difficult conditions. Notably, in the absence of phosphate, methylation also occurs more often in DNA sequences called transposable elements that sit close to these useful genes, and less often around other genes. Transposable elements, also known as ‘jumping genes’ can move within the genome and thus potentially have damaging effects through altering the DNA sequence. However, DNA methylation normally prevents this from happening. Therefore, the extra methylation observed by Secco et al. may be a cautionary measure to inactivate these transposable elements and limit their potential deleterious effects. Further experiments went on to show that these useful genes seem to be switched on before the DNA of these transposable elements is methylated, implying that the extra methylation observed in these transposable elements is a consequence of the activation of these nearby useful genes. By contrast, similar experiments performed in Arabidopsis reveal a very limited change in DNA methylation when the plants are grown under stressful conditions. This might be because Arabidopsis has considerably fewer transposable elements than rice. The next challenge will be to explore how significant the environmentally induced silencing of transposable elements is to the stress responses and genome integrity of crop plants. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.7554/eLife.09343.002

SummaryEpigenetic mechanisms have been proposed to play crucial roles in mammalian development, but their precise functions are only partially understood. To investigate epigenetic regulation of embryonic development, we differentiated human embryonic stem cells into mesendoderm, neural progenitor cells, trophoblast-like cells, and mesenchymal stem cells and systematically characterized DNA methylation, chromatin modifications, and the transcriptome in each lineage. We found that promoters that are active in early developmental stages tend to be CG rich and mainly engage H3K27me3 upon silencing in nonexpressing lineages. By contrast, promoters for genes expressed preferentially at later stages are often CG poor and primarily employ DNA methylation upon repression. Interestingly, the early developmental regulatory genes are often located in large genomic domains that are generally devoid of DNA methylation in most lineages, which we termed DNA methylation valleys (DMVs). Our results suggest that distinct epigenetic mechanisms regulate early and late stages of ES cell differentiation.

Recoding a stop codon to an amino acid may afford orthogonal genetic systems for biosynthesizing new protein and organism properties. Although reassignment of stop codons has been found in extant organisms, a model organism is lacking to investigate the reassignment process and to direct code evolution. Complete reassignment of a stop codon is precluded by release factors (RFs), which recognize stop codons to terminate translation. Here we discovered that RF1 could be unconditionally knocked out from various Escherichia coli stains, demonstrating that the reportedly essential RF1 is generally dispensable for the E. coli species. The apparent essentiality of RF1 was found to be caused by the inefficiency of a mutant RF2 in terminating all UAA stop codons; a wild type RF2 was sufficient for RF1 knockout. The RF1-knockout strains were autonomous and unambiguously reassigned UAG to encode natural or unnatural amino acids (Uaas) at multiple sites, affording a previously unavailable model for studying code evolution and a unique host for exploiting Uaas to evolve new biological functions.

Epigenetic information, which may affect an organism’s phenotype, can be stored and stably inherited in the form of cytosine DNA methylation. Changes in DNA methylation can produce meiotically stable epialleles that affect transcription and morphology, but the rates of spontaneous gain or loss of DNA methylation are unknown. We examined spontaneously occurring variation in DNA methylation in Arabidopsis thaliana plants propagated by single-seed descent for 30 generations. We identified 114,287 CG single methylation polymorphisms and 2485 CG differentially methylated regions (DMRs), both of which show patterns of divergence compared with the ancestral state. Thus, transgenerational epigenetic variation in DNA methylation may generate new allelic states that alter transcription, providing a mechanism for phenotypic diversity in the absence of genetic mutation.