Members
13th
Term: Apr. 2023 ～
:Global Type
:Tenure-track Type
● OHNUKI Mari Assistant Professor
Research Interests: Stem cell biology, Molecular biology, Human evolution
Research Topic: Identification of stem cell fate determining genes evolved by human endogenous retroviruses
Host Department: Institute for the Advanced Study of Human Biology (ASHBi)
Previous Affiliation: Institute for the Advanced Study of Human Biology (ASHBi)
Short Introduction
Genomic evolution determines phenotypic variation across species. Not just novel gene generation and amino-acid substitution, change of gene regulation, especially by cis-regulatory elements, plays a central role of the speciation. Transposable elements, in particular retrotransposons, are expected to have a great potential to drive genomic evolution as they can induce drastic changes by their copy-and-paste reproduction. They are considered to provide ‘mobile cis-regulatory elements’ that can be inserted all over the genome, thus theoretically making it possible to rewire entire gene regulatory networks. However, the link between their genomic changes and cellular phenotype in primates is still largely missing. In this project I focus on one of the primate-specific retrotransposon families, namely HERVH, by comprehensive study to cover the wide range of individual elements. The approaches from the point of view of both genomic evolution and molecular biological assessment allow us to understand human evolution driven by transposable elements.
Research activity status (external page)
