DISSERTATION RESEARCH: Contribution of Mutations within Cis-Regulatory DNA to Molecular Phenotype and Organismal Fitness

调控序列控制着基因表达的时间、位置和水平，并被预测在分子和生物进化中发挥关键作用。 尽管这种调节的重要性和丰富的基因表达的变化，这种变化对生物体的影响是未知的。 我们建议探讨如何诱导突变的特定调控区域内的啤酒酵母影响相邻基因的表达，以及在何种程度上这些差异影响生物体的健身。 这种类型的信息尚未获得任何生物。该项目的科学重要性在于更好地理解调控区域内的变异如何转化为基因表达和生物体适应性。 这项工作有两个重要的更广泛的影响。 首先，高中学生通过霍华德休斯暑期项目参与该项目的实验室组成部分。其次，从当地和澳大利亚葡萄园收集了天然分离物。 这项工作是协作性的，因为分离的菌株可用于其原产地的葡萄园，用于未来的发酵，农业社区也将受益于科学研究。

Regulatory sequences control timing, location and level of gene expression, and are predicted to play a key role in molecular and organismal evolution. Despite the importance of this regulation and the abundance of variation in gene expression, the effect this variation has on the organism is not known. We propose to explore how induced mutations within specific regulatory regions in brewer's yeast affect the expression of neighboring genes, and to what extent these differences influences organismal fitness. This type of information has not been acquired for any organism. The scientific importance of this project is to provide a greater understanding of how variation within regulatory regions translates to gene expression and organismal fitness. There are two significant broader impacts of this work. First, high school students are involved with laboratory components of this project through the Howard Hughes Summer Program. Second, natural isolates have been collected from both local and Australian vineyards. This work is collaborative in that isolated strains are made available to their vineyard of origin, for future use in fermentation, and the agriculture community is exposed to the benefits of scientific research.