Regulation of chromosome bi-orientation

人体由大约100万亿个细胞组成，每个细胞都含有相同的遗传物质（DNA），这些遗传物质决定了我们是谁和我们是什么。我们的DNA被紧密地包装成23个独立的单元，称为染色体。每次细胞分裂时，每条染色体都需要复制一次然后每对染色体中的一条需要分离到两个子细胞中。这个过程中的错误可能导致细胞死亡、细胞特性改变或无限制的细胞增殖。这些会导致各种各样的人类疾病，包括流产、出生缺陷和癌症。重要的是，来自大多数侵袭性人类肿瘤的细胞在染色体数量上表现出高度变异，这种现象被称为非整倍体。我们研究的目的是了解确保正常细胞中染色体准确分离的分子机制，希望我们能够了解这些在人类疾病期间是如何被破坏的。幸运的是，从酵母菌到人类，许多控制周期进程的关键分子事件在进化上都是保守的。因此，我们研究分裂酵母（Schizosaccharomyces pombe）的染色体分离过程，因为它非常适合于遗传、生化和免疫细胞化学分析，以及减少动物实验使用的替代工具。了解控制染色体分离的基本机制将有助于我们设计新的诊断和治疗方法，帮助我们预防或治愈这些人类疾病。

The human body is composed of approximately 100 trillion cells, each of which contain the same genetic material (DNA) that specifies who and what we are. Our DNA is tightly packaged into 23 separate units called chromosomes. Every time a cell divides, each of these chromosomes needs to be duplicated once and then one of each of the pair of chromosomes needs to be segregated to each of the two daughter cells. Mistakes in this process can lead to cell death, alterations in cell identity or unrestrained cell proliferation. These can result in a variety of human ailments including miscarriages, birth defects and cancer. Importantly, the cells from most aggressive human tumours show a high variation in chromosome numbers, a phenomenon known as aneuploidy. The aim of our research is to understand the molecular mechanisms that ensure accurate segregation of chromosomes in normal cells in the hope that we can understand how these are subverted during human disease. Fortunately, many of the key molecular events that control cycle progression have been evolutionarily conserved from yeast to man. For this reason we study the process of chromosome segregation in the fission yeast, Schizosaccharomyces pombe, since it is highly amenable to genetic, biochemical and immunocytochemical analysis and alternative tool to reduce the use of animals for experimentation. Understanding the fundamental mechanisms which control chromosome segregation will help us to design new diagnostics and therapies that will help us to prevent or cure these human ailments.