Trancriptional Regulation of Gene Expression

The program of research put forward in this proposal centres around understanding the mechanisms through which genes are switched on and off. The regulation of gene expression is essential both during the development of an organism and throughout the course of its life, and problems with this regulation can result in many different disease states, most notably cancer. At one level, gene expression is controlled by networks of specific protein molecules known as transcription factors that interact both with each other and with DNA. Currently however, the details surrounding the making and breaking of these interactions are not well understood. Knowledge of how these interactions take place will put us in a much more powerful position to control the formation of aberrant transcriptional complexes. A combination of biophysical, biochemical, and cell biological approaches will be used to firstly shed light on these complexes and secondly develop reagents that can be used to manipulate the activity of specific genes.