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基因表达的丰富变异，这种变异对生物体的影响尚不清楚。我们建议探索啤酒酵母特定调控区域内的诱导突变如何影响邻近基因的表达，以及这些差异在多大程度上影响有机体适应性。这种类型的信息还没有从任何生物体中获得。这个项目的科学重要性在于提供了对调控区域内的变异如何转化为基因表达和有机体适应性的更好理解。这项工作有两个重要的更广泛的影响。首先，高中生通过霍华德休斯暑期项目参与到这个项目的实验室组成部分。其次，从当地和澳大利亚的葡萄园中收集了自然分离的葡萄。这项工作是合作的，因为分离的菌株可以提供给它们的原产地葡萄园，供将来用于发酵，农业社区也可以从科学研究中获益。

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.