Showing papers in "Current Opinion in Genetics & Development in 2006"

TL;DR: One or more new sequencing technologies are expected to become the mainstay of future research, and to make DNA sequencing centre stage as a routine tool in genetic research in the coming years.

TL;DR: Both functions of β-catenin are de-regulated in human malignancies, thereby leading both to the loss of cell–cell adhesion and to the increased transcription of Wnt target genes.

TL;DR: Observations implicate small RNAs as important mediators of gene regulation in response to cell-cell signaling and the mechanism by which microRNAs silence gene expression is post-transcriptional, possibly influencing the stability, compartmentalization and translation of mRNAs.

TL;DR: Four recent studies have confirmed the suspicion that miRNAs regulate cell proliferation and apoptosis, and play a role in cancer.

TL;DR: Genetic manipulations have revealed new regulatory aspects, including the role of Six transcription factors and the CXCR4 cytokine receptor during embryonic myogenesis, and Pax7 is now shown to be required for the maintenance of satellite cells.

TL;DR: The current rapid progress in unravelling the diversity and complexity of epigenetic information might eventually reveal an underlying histone or epigenetic code, but whether it does or not, it will certainly provide unprecedented opportunities for understanding how the genome responds to environmental and metabolic change and for manipulating its activities for experimental and therapeutic benefit.

TL;DR: The emerging picture suggests that the binding and modification of chromatin by PcG proteins is needed for interaction of PRE-tethered P cG protein complexes with nucleosomes in the flanking chromatin in order to maintain a Polycomb-repressed chromatin state at promoters and coding regions of target genes.

TL;DR: Discovering which genes are misregulated in the absence of functional MeCP2 and demonstrating their role in causing neuronal dysfunction and disease manifestations are challenging but important steps for understanding the pathogenesis of Rett syndrome and related disorders.

TL;DR: Recent genome-wide studies have begun to unravel how genetic and epigenetic factors maintain the undifferentiated state of embryonic stem cells while allowing these cells to remain poised to differentiate into somatic cells in response to developmental cues.

TL;DR: Different ways in which the proteasome can influence transcription are discussed, and it is argued that its unique combination of biological activities makes it ideally suited to act at multiple stages in the transcription process.

TL;DR: Genomic analyses of young sex chromosome pairs support the view that X chromosomes are not passive players in this evolutionary process but respond both to their sex-biased transmission and to Y-chromosome degeneration, through feminization and the evolution of dosage compensation.

TL;DR: Several recent studies have found significant signals of gene flow during species formation, calling into question the conventional wisdom that gene flow is absent during speciation.

TL;DR: This work has yielded new insights into skin tumour development and the mechanisms by which stem cells are maintained and the pathways that interact with Wnt signalling to specify lineage choice as cells leave the stem cell compartment.

TL;DR: Eventually, even therapy of XLMR might become possible, as suggested by the unexpected plasticity of the neuronal wiring in the brain, and the recent successful drug treatment of a fly model for fragile X syndrome.

TL;DR: Using imatinib to reduceLeukemic burden also facilitates the detailed investigation into how the persistence of CML disease depends on BCR-ABL signaling, particularly within the leukemic stem cell compartment.

TL;DR: New data highlight the importance of histone dimers as deposition entities for de novo nucleosome assembly and identify dedicated machineries involved in histone variant deposition.

TL;DR: Not only do HP1 isoforms have specific binding sites in both heterochromatic and euchromatic domains but they might also participate in the repression and activation of transcription in both compartments.

TL;DR: Two studies reveal how the microRNA pathway and signaling are related to FMRP function through the metabotropic glutamate receptor and provide new insights through which to better understand the inactivation of the FMR1 gene and, in turn, the consequence of F MRP loss.

TL;DR: Drosophila models can be extended beyond basic research in the search for human therapeutics and help understand how oncogenes and tumor suppressors cooperate to achieve tumor growth and metastasis in situ.

TL;DR: Molecules involved in positive feedback signaling at the leading edge include the small G-proteins Rac and Ras, phosphatidylinositol-3 kinase and F-actin, as part of interlinked feedback loops that lead to a robust production of PI(3,4,5)P(3).

TL;DR: While PAR2 resembles the overall sequence composition of the X chromosome and exhibits only slightly elevated recombination rates, PAR1 is characterized by a significantly higher GC content and a completely different repeat structure, and represents an exceptional model to explore the correlation between meiotic recombination and evolutionary forces such as gene mutation and conversion.

TL;DR: The Aristaless-related homeobox gene, ARX, is an important transcription factor with a crucial role in forebrain, pancreas and testes development and ought to be considered for routine screening.

TL;DR: The heterogeneity observed in many types of human cancers may reflect the activation of specific oncogenes and/ or loss of specific tumor suppressor genes and the different stem and/or progenitor cell populations in which these genetic or epigenetic events occur.

TL;DR: Actin-NMI interactions are involved in the transition of the initiation complex into the elongation complex, presumably by triggering a structural change of the transcription apparatus or by generating force that supports RNA polymerase movement.

TL;DR: It appears that chromatin and chromosome conformations at all levels are highly dynamic, which is the key to their function.

TL;DR: During vertebrate gastrulation, the evolutionarily conserved morphogenetic movements of epiboly, internalization, convergence and extension cooperate to generate germ layers and to sculpt the body plan in zebrafish.

TL;DR: Africa has tremendous potential to learn about human variation and evolutionary history and to positively impact human health care from studies of genetic diversity in Africa.

TL;DR: Recent findings reveal that Wnt and Tgfbeta signalling function is instrumental in delineating the anterior-posterior embryonic axis by defining the site of primitive streak formation and by directing the movement of the visceral endoderm.

TL;DR: Biochemical work has identified a conserved chromatin-remodeling complex responsible for H2A.Z deposition and generated a chromatin pattern generated through the action of a DNA deposition signal and a specific pattern of histone tail acetylation.

TL;DR: Recent evidence continues to support a central role for TGFβ in tumor maintenance and progression and suggests opportunities for dissecting molecular mechanisms of cross-talk as well as providing insights into possible combinatorial molecular anticancer therapies that will include TGF β inhibitors.