Abstract DBI 9750052 Paul D. Rawson This action funds an NSF/Alfred P. Sloan Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Molecular Evolution for 1997. These fellowships support studies involving the theoretical, comparative, computational, and/or experimental analyses of biological patterns and processes at the molecular level within the framework of organismic evolutionary change and adaptation. These studies also include the use of molecular data to address broader evolutionary questions. Each fellowship supports a research and training plan to be carried out in a sponsoring laboratory. The research and training plan for this fellowship is entitled "Coevolution of nuclear and mitochrondrial cytochrome C oxidase genes in a marine copepod." The marine copepod Tigriopus californicus is being used to determine the degree to which cytochrome C oxidase genes are coevolving. Cytochrome C oxidase (CO) is a key enzyme of cellular respiration and is composed of subunits encoded by genes in both the nuclear and mitochrondrial genomes. Sequence variations are being used to determine the coevolution of these genes in genetically divergent Tigriopus populations. Also, it is being determined if nuclear genes from one population can regulate the expression of mitochrondrial genes from another population and affect their assembly into the holoenzyme.
