Xiaoqi Feng's Lab
Xiaoqi Feng is a plant geneticist at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria, Klosterneuburg, Austria. Her lab studies the development and epigenetics of plant germlines.
Meet the lab!Histone H2B.8 condenses plant sperm chromatin via phase separation
We report a histone variant, H2B.8, mediates sperm chromatin and nuclear condensation in Arabidopsis thaliana. We propose that H2B.8 is an evolutionary innovation of flowering plants that achieves nuclear condensation compatible with active transcription.
Nurse cell-derived small RNAs define paternal epigenetic inheritance
We report here that gentic methylation in the male germline, from meiocytes to sperm, is established by siRNAs transcribed from transposons with imperfect sequence homology.
Extensive N4 cytosine methylation in Marchantia sperm
We revealed extensive N4 cytosine methylation (4mC) in a eukaryote (Marchantia), identifies novel DNA methyltransferases, and demonstrates the biological function of 4mC during sexual development.
Male germline-specific DNA methylation
We discovered specific
Histone H1 depletion in pollen vegetative cells
We characterised the extent of TE expression in Arabidopsis pollen vegetative cells, and determined that their expression relies on loss of histone H1 in concert with the DEMETER demethylase.
Similarity of germline epigenetics in rice and Arabidopsis
In two back-to-back collaborative papers, we showed that germline cells have more robust DNA methylation in Arabidopsis and rice genomes, and that rice...
