Genetic mechanisms and evolutionary processes underlying diversity within and between species

项目摘要 这个项目的长期目标是了解遗传机制和进化过程 负责在物种内部和物种之间产生表型多样性。这包括发现 负责表型分歧的基因，确定这些基因中的哪些变化影响了表型分化。 表型，并确定这些变化如何改变分子，细胞和发育过程。它 还包括弄清楚突变和选择是如何共同作用产生这些变化的。 这些目标将通过结合发育生物学、进化生物学和遗传学的方法来实现。 遗传学，基因组学和生物信息学研究果蝇（果蝇）和酵母（酵母）。 提出的具体实验旨在解决以下三个互补的问题：（1） 表型差异背后的遗传和分子机制是什么？(2)如何监管 由控制基因表达的顺式和反式作用因子组成的网络进化？（3）什么是 突变和选择对基因表达变异的相对贡献？总的来说，这 这项工作将促进我们对基因型-表型图谱的理解，以及它们在基因型和表型之间的差异。 物种影响基因表达调节的遗传变化，这是翻译的重要步骤 基因型转化为表型，将在这项工作中特别强调。最后，从 这些研究将有助于预测和解释基因型模式的一般框架， 表型变异，包括与人类健康有关的变异。

Project summary The long-term goal of this project is to understand the genetic mechanisms and evolutionary processes responsible for generating phenotypic diversity within and between species. This includes discovering the genes responsible for phenotypic divergence, identifying which changes within these genes affect the phenotype, and determining how these changes alter molecular, cellular, and developmental processes. It also includes figuring out how mutation and selection have worked together to give rise to these changes. These goals will be accomplished by combining methods from developmental biology, evolutionary genetics, genomics, and bioinformatics to study both fruit flies (Drosophila) and yeast (Saccharomyces). Specific experiments proposed are designed to address the following three complementary questions: (1) What are the genetic and molecular mechanisms underlying phenotypic differences? (2) How do regulatory networks composed of cis- and trans-acting factors controlling gene expression evolve? and (3) What are the relative contributions of mutation and selection to variation in gene expression? Taken together, this work will advance our understanding of genotype-phenotype maps and how they vary within and between species. Genetic changes affecting the regulation of gene expression, an essential step in translating genotypes into phenotypes, will be given particular emphasis in this work. Ultimately, lessons learned from these studies will contribute to a general framework for predicting and interpreting patterns of genotypic and phenotypic variation, including variation related to human health.