FIBR: PLANNING- INTEGRATIVE STUDIES OF MUTATION BIOLOGY

参与者：乔恩·阿格利恩、乔安妮·乔里、查尔斯·芬斯特(PI)、托马斯·汉森、阿列克西·康德拉索夫、斯蒂芬·蒙特、马修·罗特(Copi)、弗兰克·肖、露丝·肖、斯蒂芬·汤莎、冈特·瓦格纳、德特尔夫·魏格尔自发突变是新的遗传变异的来源，是进化变化的原材料。许多进化模型的结果取决于突变的速度和表达。由于突变不常见，测量这些参数仅限于在实验室条件下大量饲养和分析的模型生物体。然而，要了解突变如何与自然选择和有机体的其他生态特征相互作用，需要明确量化突变率及其在野外或有机体可能遇到的特定环境条件下的影响。准确描述突变过程的性质将提供有关遗传病的出现速度及其可能的严重性，以及有害突变导致濒危物种衰落和灭绝的可能性等主题的重要信息。了解特定类型的突变如何与环境相互作用的知识，可能会让我们更好地利用现代基因技术来改善作物表现，或者识别可能特别可能在疾病中发挥作用的基因。这一Fibr计划赠款将促进一个合作项目，以研究拟南芥植物进化过程中的突变特性。我们是一群研究人员，他们的专业知识包括分子和发育遗传学、理论遗传学和基于田间的实验方法来研究植物进化。柳杉是研究突变效应的最佳选择：它是唯一一种不移动的遗传模式生物，体型大到可以在野外很容易观察到，并且在自然种群中广泛分布。因此，我们可以利用预测进化模型、尖端分子工具、已建立的突变累积线、温室和田间实验，将突变引起的遗传密码改变与随后的生存、繁殖成功和种群水平进化过程的变化联系起来。规划赠款将资助两次会议(2003年春季和秋季)，这些会议将详细确定要调查的问题。我们将创建一个研究计划，解决将分子遗传和生理信息与整个有机体水平联系起来的重要和可行的进化问题。此外，我们将确定和招募其他研究人员来加强该项目。这些会议和协作的结果将是在2003年编写并提交一份初步的FIFR提案。

Participants: Jon Agren, Joanne Chory, Charles Fenster (PI), Thomas Hansen, Alexy Kondrashov, Stephen Mount, Matthew Rutter (coPI), Frank Shaw, Ruth Shaw, Stephen Tonsor, Gunter Wagner, Detlef WeigelSpontaneous mutations are the source of new genetic variants, and are the raw material of evolutionary change. The outcomes of many evolutionary models depend upon the rate and expression of mutations. Because mutation is infrequent, measuring these parameters has been restricted to model organisms raised and assayed in large numbers in laboratory conditions. However, understanding how mutations interface with natural selection and other ecological features of the organism requires explicitly quantifying mutation rates and their effects in the wild or to specific environmental conditions that the organism is likely to encounter. An accurate description of the properties of the mutation process will provide important information about such topics as the rate of emergence of genetic disease and their likely severity, and the potential for detrimental mutations to lead to the decline and extinction of endangered species. Knowledge about the ways in which specific types of mutation interface with the environment may allow us to better use modern genetic techniques to improve crop performance or identify genes that may be especially likely to play a role in disease. This FIBR Planning Grant will facilitate a collaborative project to investigate mutation properties on evolutionary processes in the plant Arabidopsis thaliana. We are a group of researchers whose expertise includes molecular and developmental genetics, theoretical genetics, and field-based experimental approaches to the study of plant evolution. A. thaliana is optimal for the study of mutational effects: it is the only genetic model organism that does not move, is large enough to easily observe in the wild, and widely distributed in natural populations. Thus, we can utilize predictive evolutionary models, cutting-edge molecular tools, established mutation accumulation lines, greenhouse and field experiments to connect alterations of the genetic code caused by mutation with subsequent changes in survival, reproductive success, and population-level evolutionary processes. The planning grant will fund two meetings (in spring and fall of 2003) that will define in detail the questions to be investigated. We will create a research plan that addresses important and feasible evolutionary questions that link molecular genetic and physiological information to the level of the whole organism. Furthermore, we will identify and recruit other researchers who would enhance the project. The outcome of these meetings and collaborations will be to prepare and submit a preliminary FIBR proposal in 2003.