cheryl_andam

A tale of sex: gene sharing between microbial species, genomes and microbiomes

Horizontal gene transfer (HGT) is an important evolutionary process that allows the spread of innovations between distantly related organisms. In this webinar, I will present recent findings on the process, driving factors and impacts of HGT in light of recent developments in next-generation sequencing approaches. I will discuss examples of HGT within species, between species and between microbial communities, and how these gene exchange networks drive the genetic and phenotypic diversity of microbes in nature and clinical settings

ido_goldstein

Transcription Factor Assisted Loading and Enhancer Dynamics Dictate the Hepatic Fasting Response

Fasting elicits transcriptional programs in hepatocytes leading to glucose and ketone production. This transcriptional program is regulated by many transcription factors (TFs). To understands how this complex network regulates the metabolic response to fasting we aimed at isolating the enhancers and TFs dictating it. Measuring chromatin accessibility revealed that fasting massively reorganizes liver chromatin, exposing numerous fasting-induced enhancers.

kumar_selvarajoo

Systems Biology to Overcome TRAIL Resistance in Cancer Treatment

Over the last decade, our research team has investigated the dynamic responses and global properties of living cells using systems biology approaches. More specifically, we have developed computational models and statistical techniques to interpret instructive cell signaling and high-throughput transcriptome-wide behaviors of immune, cancer, and embryonic development cells.

michael_hucka

SBML (the Systems Biology Markup Language) and related resources for computational systems biology

Computational modeling allows biologists to create formal models of cellular phenomena that can be simulated, analyzed and compared to experimental data. Biologists today have at their disposal a wide range of software tools for their modeling efforts. The wealth of resources is a boon to researchers, but it also presents interoperability problems.

edward_collantes

Precision Medicine for the Ophthalmologist: Next-generation genetic tools in approaching eye disease

The identification of disease-causing genes provides information about the pathogenesis of heritable eye diseases at the most basic level. Finding the causative gene of a disease helps the patient move beyond the unknown into the world of knowing what they have, what the future might hold, recurrence risk assessment, identification of at risk family members, contact with appropriate support groups, knowledge of what else to look for, and appropriate surveillance screening, and most importantly, the new possibility of gene based treatment.

mark_petalcorin

CRISPR/Cas9 Targeted Genome Editing: Tips and Considerations

The genome found in every cell of our body contains over 20 thousand genes and over 3 billion letters of DNA that sustains life, shapes who we are and determines our risks of having a disease. CRISPR/Cas (clustered regularly interspaced palindromic repeats) is a recently discovered antiviral defence system in bacteria that has become the favorite set of tools to edit and correct any diseased genome and change any sequence of DNA in precisely chosen genomic location performed not in a test tube but within the nucleus of our living cell.