Abstract
Recent functional studies have unveiled the significant role chromatin topology plays in gene regulation. Several lines of evidence suggest genes access necessary factors for transcription by forming chromatin loops. In addition the role of long noncoding RNA has emerged as playing critical role in the regulation of transcription first in the assembly of chromatin loops and secondly in epigenetic modifications that can silence or permit transcription. Here we reveal the unprecedented level of influence of gene loops on transcription, concurrent with long-range contacts between co-regulated genes. In addition we reveal how pathogens have exploited long noncoding RNAs to evade host defense mechanisms.
Biography
Musa M. Mhlanga (USA citizen), American-born male cell biologist, holds a PhD in cell biology & molecular genetics from New York University School of Medicine (2003). He began his PhD at the Rockefeller University in the laboratory of David Ho where he worked on spectral genotyping of human alleles. He then went on to work on the development of in vitro and in vivo applications of molecular beacons for their use in visualizing RNA in living cells with Fred Russell Kramer and Sanjay Tyagi at New York University School of Medicine. Upon completion of his doctoral work he was awarded a U.S. National Science Foundation post-doctoral fellowship at the Institut Pasteur in Paris, France to work in the laboratory of nuclear cell biology. There he worked on RNA transport and single molecule visualization and tracking of RNA in living cells.
In late 2008 he moved his lab to South Africa to join the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research as the Research Leader of the Synthetic Biology Emerging Research Area. He heads the Laboratory for Gene Expression & Biophysics and holds a joint appointment to the Institute of Molecular Medicine in Lisbon, Portugal. His laboratory works on gene regulation, host-pathogen interactions, single molecule imaging of gene expression and the development of cell-based visual high-throughput biology techniques for screening in basic and clinical biology.