Chromosome organization mediated by structural maintenance of chromosomes (SMC)
complexes is vital in many organisms. SMC complexes act as motors that extrude DNA
loops, but it remains unclear what happens when multiple complexes encounter one
another on the same DNA in living cells and how these interactions may help to organize an
active genome. We therefore created a crash-course track system to study SMC complex
encounters in vivo by engineering defined SMC loading sites in the Bacillus subtilis …

Chromosome organization by structural maintenance of chromosomes (SMC) complexes is
vital to living organisms. SMC complexes were recently found to be motors that extrude DNA
loops. However, it remains unclear what happens when multiple complexes encounter one
another in vivo on the same DNA and how interactions help organize an active genome. We
created a crash-course track system to study SMC complex encounters in vivo by
engineering the Bacillus subtilis chromosome to have defined SMC loading sites …