Coactivator assembly at the promoter: efficient recruitment of SRC2 is coupled to cooperative DNA binding by the progesterone receptor.

A largely unsolved problem in eukaryotic gene regulation focuses on the mechanisms by which DNA-bound transcription factors recruit coactivators to a promoter. Recent work has suggested that promoter DNA acts as an allosteric ligand, serving not only to bind and localize transcription factors but also to trigger structural changes within the proteins in order to elicit coactivator recruitment. Unfortunately, a quantitative and molecular understanding of this phenomenon remains unclear. We have previously resolved the microstate interaction energetics of progesterone receptor A-isoform (PR-A) assembly at multiple promoters; here we extend this work to the role of PR-A in mediating promoter-dependent recruitment of the coactivator, SRC2. Quantitative footprinting and statistical thermodynamic modeling of PR-A:promoter interactions in the presence and absence of coactivator demonstrate that receptor binding to a single response element is maximally coupled to a 2-fold enhancement in SRC2 binding. By contrast, PR-A assembly at multiple response elements is linked to an additional 6- to 10-fold increase in SRC2 affinity. This effect arises due to a coupled reaction between SRC2 uptake and enhanced cooperative interactions between adjacently bound PR-A dimers. Put another way, increased coactivator levels stabilize a higher-order receptor-promoter complex. These results may thus not only offer a mechanism for explaining the weak transcriptional activity seen for promoters containing a single binding site and the synergistically strong activity seen for multisite promoters but also suggest that in vivo fluctuations of coactivator levels might serve as a physiological regulator of assembly for PR-A (and for other nuclear receptors) at the promoter.