Bar-Ilan part of int'l team to receive grant for work in nuclear dynamics
The researchers believe that these subsets have special properties, and high levels of gene expression which could be used to treat disease, pro-long life and health.
By JERUSALEM POST STAFFBar Ilan University, engineering department(photo credit: BAR ILAN UNIVERSITY/ WIKIMEDIA COMMONS)
A researcher from Bar-Ilan University is part of an international research team that was recently awarded a $4 million grant by the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) for its work in nuclear dynamics and gene regulation.Prof. Yaron Shav-Tal, alongside lead researcher Prof. Andrew Belmont of the University of Illinois and Prof. Kyu Young of the University of Central Florida, found that the cell nucleus is a structure that holds many other “nuclear bodies” inside, they said in a press release.With the help of the grant, the scientists will attempt to discover how the nuclear bodies interact with the chromosomes that contain the genetic code, in addition to other biomolecules, such as RNA and proteins.The NIH awarded the group a grant within its 4D Nucleome Program, an initiative aiming to study how DNA is arranged within cells in space and time and how that can be applied to health and disease. Think time travel, but in health terms.Belmont headed research at Illinois, which revealed a compartmentalized area in the nucleus that is specific to gene expression. The subregion sits on the edge of what is called the “nuclear speckle,” larger nuclear bodies that contain RNA processing proteins, the RNA proteins themselves and transcription factors, without the presence of DNA.The scientists found that there is a large subset of genes that could be found in almost all cells that resemble speckles. The researchers said they believe that these subsets have special properties and high levels of gene expression, which could be used to treat disease and prolong life and health.To perform the research, the team will use live-cell imaging to isolate the gene motion within the nuclear compartments to test the theory that one group of genes travels through the nuclear speckles and the other group travels to other structures.The laboratory at Bar-Ilan will be used to study if and how the nuclear compartments are involved in RNA protein movement from the site of transcription to “export into the cytoplasm through the nuclear pores.”
