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Evolution after Introduction of a Novel Metabolic Pathway Consistently Leads to Restoration of Wild-Type Physiology
(Public Library of Science, 2013)
Organisms cope with physiological stressors through acclimatizing mechanisms in the short-term and adaptive mechanisms over evolutionary timescales. During adaptation to an environmental or genetic perturbation, beneficial ...
Genetic Characterization of smg-8 Mutants Reveals No Role in C. elegans Nonsense Mediated Decay
(Public Library of Science, 2012)
The nonsense mediated decay (NMD) pathway degrades mRNAs bearing premature translation termination codons. In mammals, SMG-8 has been implicated in the NMD pathway, in part by its association with SMG-1 kinase. Here we use ...
The Methanol Dehydrogenase Gene, mxaF, as a Functional and Phylogenetic Marker for Proteobacterial Methanotrophs in Natural Environments
(Public Library of Science, 2013)
The mxaF gene, coding for the large \((\alpha)\) subunit of methanol dehydrogenase, is highly conserved among distantly related methylotrophic species in the Alpha-, Beta- and Gammaproteobacteria. It is ubiquitous in ...
Phenotypes and genetic mechanisms of C. elegans enhanced RNAi
(2013-10-08)
RNA interference (RNAi) potently and specifically induces gene knockdown, and its potential for reverse genetics in Caenorhabditis elegans is enormous. However, even in these nematodes, RNAi can be induced more effectively ...
Gene-Drug Interactions and the Evolution of Antibiotic Resistance
(2013-03-18)
The evolution of antibiotic resistance is shaped by interactions between genes, the chemical environment, and an antibiotic's mechanism of action. This thesis explores these interactions with experiments, theory, and ...
Chromatin Modification by PSC Occurs at One PSC per Nucleosome and Does Not Require the Acidic Patch of Histone H2A
(Public Library of Science, 2012)
Chromatin architecture is regulated through both enzymatic and non-enzymatic activities. For example, the Polycomb Group (PcG) proteins maintain developmental gene silencing using an array of chromatin-based mechanisms. ...
GW8510 Increases Insulin Expression in Pancreatic Alpha Cells through Activation of p53 Transcriptional Activity
(Public Library of Science, 2012)
Background: Expression of insulin in terminally differentiated non-beta cell types in the pancreas could be important to treating type-1 diabetes. Previous findings led us to hypothesize involvement of kinase inhibition ...
Mapping the Fitness Landscape of Gene Expression Uncovers the Cause of Antagonism and Sign Epistasis between Adaptive Mutations
(Public Library of Science, 2014)
How do adapting populations navigate the tensions between the costs of gene expression and the benefits of gene products to optimize the levels of many genes at once? Here we combined independently-arising beneficial ...
A Selective HDAC 1/2 Inhibitor Modulates Chromatin and Gene Expression in Brain and Alters Mouse Behavior in Two Mood-Related Tests
(Public Library of Science, 2013)
Psychiatric diseases, including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and major depression, are projected to lead global disease burden within the next decade. Pharmacotherapy, the primary – albeit often ineffective – treatment ...
Non-Enzymatic Copying of Nucleic Acid Templates
(2014-02-25)
All known living cells contain a complex set of molecular machinery to support their growth and replication. However, the earliest cells must have been much simpler, consisting of a compartment and a genetic material to ...