Reorganization of postmitotic neuronal chromatin accessibility for maturation of serotonergic identity.

Abstract

Assembly of transcriptomes encoding unique neuronal identities requires selective accessibility of transcription factors to cis-regulatory sequences in nucleosome-embedded postmitotic chromatin. Yet, the mechanisms controlling postmitotic neuronal chromatin accessibility are poorly understood. Here, we show that unique distal enhancers define the <i>Pet1</i> neuron lineage that generates serotonin (5-HT) neurons in mice. Heterogeneous single-cell chromatin landscapes are established early in postmitotic <i>Pet1</i> neurons and reveal the putative regulatory programs driving <i>Pet1</i> neuron subtype identities. Distal enhancer accessibility is highly dynamic as <i>Pet1</i> neurons mature, suggesting the existence of regulatory factors that reorganize postmitotic neuronal chromatin. We find that Pet1 and Lmx1b control chromatin accessibility to select <i>Pet1</i>-lineage-specific enhancers for 5-HT neurotransmission. Additionally, these factors are required to maintain chromatin accessibility during early maturation suggesting that postmitotic neuronal open chromatin is unstable and requires continuous regulatory input. Together, our findings reveal postmitotic transcription factors that reorganize accessible chromatin for neuron specialization.