H2020Индивидуална стипендия2017–2019

PREMETAZOAEPIGENOME · The role of genome regulation in the origin of animals

„Хоризонт 2020“ — Действия „Мария Склодовска-Кюри“

Период: 2017-09-01 → 2019-08-31
Финансиране от ЕС: 158 122 €
Участници: 1
Схема: MSCA-IF-EF-RI

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Накратко на български

Регулацията на генома при едноклетъчните ихтиоспореи, като Sphaeroforma arctica, се анализира чрез промените в генната им експресия. Това помага да се разбере как е възникнала сложната многоклетъчност и способността за диференциране на клетките при животните.

Този кратък обзор е генериран от изкуствен интелект

Кратко обяснение, генерирано от езиков модел по текста на CORDIS. Оригиналът е по-долу.

Резултати накратко

The role of genome regulation in the origin of animals

The origin of animals is perhaps one of the most dramatic events in the natural history. In order to illuminate how this transition from unicellular life to complex multicellularity occurred, my project aimed to study close relatives of animals that have branched from the lineage that led to animals recently, that is, close relatives of animals. By understanding the molecular biology of these organisms and using a comparative approach, we were hoping to infer what aspects of the complexity seen in animals already originated before the emergence of animals. The particular focus of PREMETAZOAEPIGENOME was understanding the regulation of the genome in these unicellular relatives of animals. In animals, the expression of genes in time and space – the process that is regulated by complex mechanisms that involves networks of transcription factors as well as histone posttranslational modification. This regulatory complexity enables cell differentiation into multiple cell types. In contrast, the regulation of the genome in well-studied unicellular organisms was shown to be much less complex. Thus, the aim of the PREMETAZOAEPIGENOME was to investigate the genome regulation in a clade of close unicellular relatives of animals called ichthyosporeans. In this project, we have successfully established one of the ichthyosporeans, Sphaeroforma arctica, as a tractable experimental organism. We have successfully characterized its life cycle in the laboratory, we have obtained a better version of its genome, and we have characterized the gene expression changes during its life cycle. These results will in the future enable us to understand how its genome is regulated, and whether it has some of the regulatory complexity seen in animals.

Текст от CORDIS, на английски · Данни: CORDIS, © Европейски съюз

Цел на проекта

The goal of this proposal is to understand how animals emerged from their unicellular ancestors. It is clear that the role of the genome regulation at the level of chromatin organization plays a crucial role in cell type specification, a hallmark of animals. However, how these genome regulatory mechanisms arose and whether they were already present in the unicellular ancestor of animals remains an open question. So far, there is minimal information to address this question from a comparative point of view. To fill this gap, we will characterize histone modifications, DNA methylation and open chromatin regions in one of the closest unicellular relatives of animals, an ichthyosporean Creolimax fragrantissima, which exhibits a multicellular-like developmental cycle. In particular, we will carry out a comprehensive genome-wide analysis of histone modifications by ChIP-Seq, ATAC-Seq, as well as techniques for detecting the distribution of 6-methyladenosine DNA marks, during the developmental cycle. In parallel, we will also investigate the Myc transcription factor network. Myc, along with its partners Max and Mad have been discovered in unicellular holozoans, suggesting that the network has already regulated cell proliferation and differentiation in the unicellular ancestor of animals. We will detect the genomic targets of Myc, Max and Mad proteins by performing ChIP-Seq. To complement these results with functional studies, we will develop genome editing tools in Creolimax. The data and the comparative analyses will provide significant insights into the nature of the regulatory genome of the last unicellular ancestor of animals. Specifically, we will learn whether the last unicellular ancestor already possessed features of complex genome regulation, such as distal enhancers, gene silencing, and dynamic regulation of chromatin states during development, and to what extent the complexity and function of the Myc transcription factor network was already present.

Оригинален текст от CORDIS (на английски).

Участници

AGENCIA ESTATAL CONSEJO SUPERIOR DE INVESTIGACIONES CIENTIFICAS · MadridКоординаторИспания