Cell type–specific genomics of Drosophila neurons

Many tools are available to analyse genomes but are often challenging to use in a cell type–specific context. We have developed a method similar to the isolation of nuclei tagged in a specific cell type (INTACT) technique [Deal,R.B. and Henikoff,S. (2010) A simple method for gene expression and chromatin profiling of individual cell types within a tissue. Dev. Cell, 18, 1030–1040; Steiner,F.A., Talbert,P.B., Kasinathan,S., Deal,R.B. and Henikoff,S. (2012) Cell-type-specific nuclei purification from whole animals for genome-wide expression and chromatin profiling. Genome Res., doi:10.1101/gr.131748.111], first developed in plants, for use in Drosophila neurons. We profile gene expression and histone modifications in Kenyon cells and octopaminergic neurons in the adult brain. In addition to recovering known gene expression differences, we also observe significant cell type–specific chromatin modifications. In particular, a small subset of differentially expressed genes exhibits a striking anti-correlation between repressive and activating histone modifications. These genes are enriched for transcription factors, recovering those known to regulate mushroom body identity and predicting analogous regulators of octopaminergic neurons. Our results suggest that applying INTACT to specific neuronal populations can illuminate the transcriptional regulatory networks that underlie neuronal cell identity.